Purple Serum
by theofoz
Summary: When Tris sacrifices herself to the Erudite, what happens next looks very different from Tobias's desperate point of view. Jeanine's experimental purple serum turns out to be a powerful weapon in her campaign to destroy the Divergent. Tris and Tobias will have to save themselves and each other, unite the Divergent, and use the purple serum to save their city.
1. Chapter 1

_**Thank you, Veronica Roth! Great book, great characters, and I don't own them - I'm just going to play around with them a little bit. When I read Insurgent, this is initially what I thought was happening. Please R&R! **_

"Tris!" I shout, my throat burning from the screaming. "I want to see her!" I'm drawing in a breath to yell again when a hand presses up to the glass at the top of the door.

Her hand. I would know it anywhere. The small oval of her fingertips and angle of her wrist, even the nails, ragged and bitten to the beds.

"Tris," my lips form her name soundlessly as I pull myself up to the window.

She's there, barefoot, surrounded by guards, her eyes red-rimmed with exhaustion. I don't see any obvious marks on her, though, and she looks steady, so I don't think they've been hurting her the way they've been hurting me. I guess that's one thing to be grateful for.

I think of everything I want to tell her - how much I love her, how sorry I am that I failed to save her, that I can't live without her... She gives me a little nod, never taking her eyes off mine, as if she can hear me. I squeeze my eyes shut and lean my forehead against the door, lining my hand up with hers, imagining I can feel its warmth through the glass. And I stay like that, long after I know she's gone.

Later, when a Dauntless traitor comes in with a tray of food, it could be that only minutes have passed. Or maybe hours. Maybe days. It doesn't matter.

"Is she dead?" I ask dully, head bowed, knowing he won't answer and not caring. But he pauses at the door as he walks back out, and without turning around says quietly: "She was brave. She was Dauntless."

I stare after him in surprise as the door closes. Of course Tris was brave. That goes without saying, even by the traitors.

But the fact that he said she was Dauntless - and the way he said it...

Maybe the traitor dauntless aren't so enamored of their Erudite allies after all.

I laugh out loud. Wouldn't that be ironic, if this were to be the thing that brings our broken faction back together? They would say they were honoring her because she died dauntless, but only I would know the truth. Her last act was not brave. It was not bold. It was selfless. This was all about being Abnegation, not Dauntless.

Well, it was both. She was both. Divergent, to the very end.

I sink my head into my hands and give myself over to the grief and loss and guilt. But it doesn't take me long to realize that Tris wouldn't want this. She saw me as strong and unstoppable, not helpless and self indulgent. I sit up and shake my head.

Think, Tobias. Think. What comes next?

Tori and Harrison will know by now that we were wrong about the timing of our attack on Erudite headquarters. Our informants would have seen to that. The Factionless will know. It may be too late for them to save Tris, but it's not too late to stop Jeanine. If the traitor Dauntless are restive, that could be very much be to our advantage - if they help us, we might be able to surprise her before she can activate another attack simulation.

So I plan and I wait.

Later, when the guard comes into the room, I slide the tray of uneaten food next to me, so he will have to come close to get it. I touch his wrist when he reaches for it, and our eyes meet briefly. I raise my eyebrows, and he nods - it is a slight movement. So slight that anyone watching on camera would not have seen it.

He takes the tray.

"You should eat it next time," he says, flicking his chin at it. "You're going to need your strength," he pauses meaningfully. "Considering what they have planned for you."

"When?" I say, without emotion.

"Soon, I guess," he shrugs, as though he could care less. "Maybe tomorrow. Probably the next day."

What I take from that is there will be an attack, probably in two days.

As the days inch by, I develop something of a routine: eat, pace, sit ups, push ups, recite the Dauntless manifesto, think through the plans, sleep. I manage to work out a sort of code with the guard, so I know I will join a group of fighters who will focus on capturing Jeanine; the other group will raid the control rooms and destroy the simulation data. Most of the traitor Dauntless are with us, and even some of the Erudite.

When the door opens again, and the guard walks in with three other Dauntless traitors, I feel my pulse pick up. This is it... but the look on his face stops me.

"She wants to see you."

"She" could only be Jeanine.

And it dawns on me - why now? Why not sooner? I've been so focused on the plans that it hadn't occurred to me that she has not tried any serum on me since Tris died.

The thought leaves me cold. Not just the reminder that Tris is dead, but the realization that Jeanine must have developed a serum she thinks will work.

As we round a corner, momentarily out of the range of the cameras, one of the guards pushes a gun under my waistband, pulling my shirt over it. It feels good, familiar, nestled there against the small of my back. "You need to stall her, Four," he mutters. "we need as much time as you can get us."

I nod but say nothing as we emerge back under the unblinking eye of the camera.

I recognize the room they have brought me to - the last place I saw Tris alive, before they marched her past my door. Where Jeanine injected her with the fear serum and I gave up the factionless safe houses.

I feel fingertips on my back, urging me forward. Reassuring, not relentless.


	2. Chapter 2

I step into the room, squinting at the fluorescent shimmer off the bright white walls. The murmur of the Erudite, bent over their screens and calculations, is indistinguishable from the whir of the machines. Strangely, something that sounds like a heartbeat thrums in the background. I wonder if it's adrenaline making my own pulse echo in my ears.

My eyes swivel to one Erudite, in particular. Caleb Prior, headphones on, peering up at a screen over a metal table. He's taking notes in a record book perched on his knees. Although his eyes never waver from the screen, he licks his lips nervously and pushes his glasses up his nose. I can tell he knows I'm in the room, and it makes him uncomfortable. Good.

"How do you do it" I say quietly, catching his eyes, my peripheral vision narrowing as the fury rises like bile in my throat. "How do you live with yourself after what you did to her? Your sister?" Caleb stares at me, his headphones around his neck now, his mouth slack. "She trusted you," I say, still quiet, disgust sharpening the edges of my words.

"Ah, Mr. Eaton," Jeanine says, crossing the room, "at last." Her eyes gleam with malice. No, not malice. Something else. Triumph.

"I am so glad you are here. I have something to show you."

She motions me to move closer to Caleb, who quickly skitters out of the way, dropping his notebook. It is only then that I realize there is someone lying on the metal table. A body.

Heat rushes through my ears. My vision wavers and my lungs seem to squeeze shut.

It is Tris.

From the uneasy rustle behind me, it sounds as though the Dauntless traitors didn't know she was here, either.

She does not move and does not appear to be breathing, but she also does not look like a three-day old corpse. Her skin is pale, but smooth, her short blonde hair fans around her face.

"What have you done?" I say numbly, my shock swiftly giving way to a all-consuming anger. "Wasn't it enough to kill her?" I shout at Jeanine. "You have to desecrate the body, too?" I howl and lunge at her, the hands behind me holding me back. Jeanine just raises her own hand calmly, with a small, smug smile.

"Oh, she is not dead, I assure you, Mr. Eaton."

I stop straining against the guards as one of them presses the gun into my spine, reminding me that we have a plan. I continue to stare at her, full of hatred, but I grind my teeth and subvert my emotions. Focus on the target. Inhale. Exhale.

Jeanine smiles again. "She is not dead," she repeats.

"Then what?" I croak harshly. "What's wrong with her? What have you done to her?"

"She is in a sim-u-la-tion," she pronounces each syllable separately, as though she is savoring the idea, which she no doubt is. "And I'm not doing anything to her. She is doing it to herself."


	3. Chapter 3

Jeanine holds up a syringe full of purple liquid. "This is how I will neutralize the Divergent," she says, tapping the glass with her fingernail. "Ms. Prior showed me the way – she's been under the simulation for three days now, with no sign that she will ever be able to escape from it."

Jeanine nods to the guards behind me and steps closer. "Now I just need to verify it will work on another Divergent – you, obviously, Mr. Eaton."

She's not laughing now. "Mr. Prior, if you please, explain to Mr. Eaton why we need to test the serum on him, too"

"It's good science," he mumbles keeping his eyes on the floor between us. "We have to make sure the results of a clinical trial are repeatable."

"Put him there," Jeanine orders the Dauntless, pointing to a metal chair with leather straps on the arms and legs. Wires are draped over the collar on the headrest.

I try to stall some more.

"What will you do with us, once you know if it works?"

Jeanine shrugs. "We will execute you, of course. You knew that." She looks at the guards, her eyes sliding over them, as though they are not worth the time it would take to look at them directly. "Are you having trouble understanding my orders?" she says flatly. "Put him in the chair now."

"Lady," says my jailer, "we're Dauntless, and we don't take orders from anyone."

The knife in his hand appears so quickly I don't even see where it came from, and he grabs Jeanine. He is not a tall man – in fact, Jeanine is nearly his height. But he is broad-shouldered and powerfully built and easily twists her arms behind her with one hand, holding the blade to her throat with the other. The other guards aim their guns at the Erudite, yelling at them to lie face down on the floor.

With the gun now in my hand, I rush closer to the metal table and lean over Tris. The heartbeat I can hear is hers, amplified by a cable taped to her chest.

"Release me this instance!" Jeanine shrieks. "This is not what we agreed to!"

"No it's not," my guard agrees smoothly, regarding her without emotion. "We agreed to help you save the factions and rule the city. We never agreed to put you in charge of everything, including who lives and who dies."

"Really? Leo, isn't it? Jeanine says shrewdly, now deadly calm. "You didn't seem to mind so much when it meant killing Abnegation, did you, Leo? Or when Max put you in charge of turning your own faction into mindless assassins?"

"Not, mind you," Jeanine snorts, "that you were ever much more than that in the first place."

I look up at the man who now has a name, Leo, startled that he might have been more than just another guard. He is a little older than the other traitors, with a tan face and wary eyes, a little gray showing in the tight curls at his temple. He looks grimly at me, and I'm not sure if I see regret or an apology shadowed in his face, but I can definitely see blood oozing from under the knife blade and his knuckles are white.

"Leo," I say quietly, resting one hand on Tris's forehead, the other pointing the gun at Jeanine's head. "We need Jeanine's vocal chords to be intact - we're going to want to make her talk, at some point." I nod at her throat.

He looks down at the blood running into her silk blue blouse in surprise and relaxes his hand a little.

"But we sure don't need her to talk right now - I suggest you gag her and get these people out of here."

He nods back at me briskly.

"You can't save her!" Jeanine shouts at me before Leo can find a cloth to stuff into her mouth.

"Always wanted to shut her up," he mutters, with a half smile at me.


	4. Chapter 4

_**Should just mention - author's note: I don't own this story or any of the characters! They belong to Veronica Roth, but I sure am having fun with them...**_

I take a closer look at Tris as the others bind and gag the Erudite. She appears to be in a deep coma, clearly alive but completely motionless. I lift her eyelids and pinch her hand, but she shows no reaction at all.

"Tris… Tris – can you hear me? It's me, it's Tobias." I whisper in her ear. "It's safe now – you can come back now. Come back to me." No reaction.

She has electrodes attached to her head, and when I follow the wires, I realize they are connected to the screen above the table. One side of the screen shows a scan of what is presumably Tris's brain, with activity lines scrolling by below. The other side shows – me? In a room – is that an Abnegation house?

After I shake off my initial shock, I realize it must be what Tris is seeing in her simulation.

"Four," Leo says urgently, "we have to get this group out of here and take Jeanine somewhere secure."

"Yeah, okay," I mumble, without taking my eyes off the screen.

"We're going to need you, man, for the assault – it's time."

"No," I say quietly, gesturing at the table, "no. I have to stay here. She needs me more."

Leo glances briefly at the screen, hesitates, and then nods at me. He pushes Jeanine roughly out of the room as the other Dauntless force the Erudite to their feet.

"We'll be back, Four," one of them says. "Be careful – some of the Erudite are armed." He chuckles, without any real mirth: "Some even know how to shoot." I nod absently.

I grab the headphones Caleb left dangling from the nearby keyboard and put them on.

"I'm here, Tris," I rasp in her ear, just as I hear my own voice in the headphones say, "You're in my group…"

Is that what I really sound like? Deep and rumbling, stern and a little forbidding? Or is that just how I sound to Tris? I'm not sure which is worse.

"…during the attack," I continue, sitting next to her on a plain and narrow bed that could only be inside an Abnegation house. "I hope you don't mind. We're supposed to lead the way to the control rooms." My words sound as though I'm giving her a choice, but my tone sure doesn't. I know kindness isn't my strong suit, but am I really like that? Even when we're alone together?

The simulation doesn't let you hear the subject's thoughts, unfortunately, only to see what she sees and hear what she hears, though I can see Tris herself. She's clearly thinking hard. If there were a serum that would let me hear her thoughts, I'd definitely take it.

Not so different from real life, I think wryly.

Tris twists her fingers together, and the on-screen Tobias asks her, "What is it?"

"I still can't fire a gun. And after what happened in Erudite headquarters… Risking my life doesn't seem so appealing anymore."

The real me and simulated me breathe out "Tris," in relief, pretty much the same way at the same time, and both of us touch her, he on the cheek and me on the arm. OK, that's just creepy.

On screen, I suddenly look younger, not so stern. "You don't have to go," I say gently.

"I don't want to seem like a coward."

"Hey," I say to her, and suddenly I look a little forbidding again, as I touch her jaw. "You have done more for this faction than any other person. You…you're the bravest person I've ever met. Stay here. Let yourself mend."

My eyes cloud with tears as I watch myself kiss her, but then I notice something else. She is biting the inside of her cheek, which I know she does sometimes when she's unsure of herself or hiding something. We lie down, and she turns away from me, my arms wrapping around her. Her face is troubled.

That is exactly how she looked when she promised me she wouldn't go to Erudite headquarters. I knew then she was lying to me, and I know it now.

"What are you up to, Tris?" I whisper, as the virtual me falls asleep. Tris stares out the window, a tear rolling down her cheek as her eyelids start to sag.

Suddenly, the screen goes dark.


	5. Chapter 5

"No!" I gasp, ripping off the headphones. I grab her shoulders to shake her when I realize I can still hear the thud of her amplified heart. I put my ear to her chest to be sure, and there it is, steady and strong. She's alive.

I sit back down, rubbing the back of my neck wearily. I look up and see the screen is still dark. The activity lines on the brain scan are barely moving. I'm desperately wondering what could have gone wrong when it hits me.

She's asleep.

She fell asleep in the simulation, and she really is asleep. As a former administrator of simulations, I can't help but be fascinated that her body in real life is mirroring what's happening in her mind to this degree. Or maybe her real body is tired and is making her simulated self sleep? I shake my head. Not the time to go all Erudite.

But it is time to look around. I realize right away that the monitor is hooked up to a computer, and my pulse quickens. Of course they would be recording her simulation. I can go back and watch what's happened so far, maybe figure out what the purple serum does and how to break her out of this.

The data file for her simulation is huge – it would be, given that it's three day's-worth of data, but it's large, even for that. In fact, it's so big they have saved it in multiple files.

I scan the other folders on the system and see that most of them are for physical monitoring, including of an IV in her arm. Unfortunately, there's no file helpfully titled "about this program" or "how to operate" or just "why."

The hard drive only has this experiment on it, but it does appear that I can get into the main frame from here. I try to access it to see if I can help destroy the attack simulation files, but it's password protected. I could probably figure it out, but it would take time, and I can't afford that right now. I'll just have to hope the traitor Dauntless can get to the control rooms.

I open Tris's first file, putting on the headphones, and do a double take when I see the computer screen. We're in this same room and Tris is in exactly the same spot.

"Take the body to the lab," I hear Jeanine say. "The autopsy is scheduled for this afternoon." Tris appears to be dead – even the heart monitor has gone silent. I shift one ear out nervously, just to check that her heart is, in fact, still beating in real life. It is.

On screen, Peter and Caleb disconnect her from all the monitors, and Peter pushes her on the table, out of the room.

I look away from the computer and under the table and see that it does, in fact, have wheels. She doesn't miss much. Or maybe that detail was programmed in?

I frown. This is not anything like a normal simulation so far – it's just a continuation of the situation she was in, not a scenario of some kind. Although I suppose the ultimate fear landscape would be watching yourself be dead. Most fear landscapes end just before you die.

Peter is speeding up as he wheels her down the halls, practically running. He ditches the table and picks her up.

"For someone so small, you're heavy, Stiff," he mutters to her, though Tris still appears to be dead.

I recognize where they are now – my cell. Peter keys the door open, and I rush out, promptly losing it when I see Tris.

"Spare me your blubbering, okay?" Peter snaps. "She's not dead; she's just paralyzed. It'll only last for about a minute. Now get ready to run."

"Let me carry her," I say on screen, reaching for her.

"No, you're a better shot than I am. Take my gun. I'll carry her."

As I watch them – us – run down the pale maze of hallways, I try to understand what I am seeing. It's not really a fear landscape. What is this? I'm momentarily distracted from attempting to answer my own question when I see that Tris has regained consciousness on screen, and I am kissing her, in what appears to be a garbage dump. Romantic. Someone has a sense of humor.

"Unless you want me to throw up all over you guys, you might want to save it for later," Peter says, explaining that we will be escaping through the incinerator, which he has turned off. Clever, Peter – wait, no. It's a simulation – someone must have inserted that detail. I snort – I doubt very much that the real Peter would have gone to so much trouble to help the two of us escape.

In fact, that's important. Peter is not acting like Peter. Tris would have noticed that, too, and it should have tipped her off that she was in a simulation. It should have allowed her to break out. Why didn't it?

I look away from the simulation to get a closer look at the data files. There doesn't appear to be any code or programming involved – it's all just output data. Usually, we're inserting code into the simulation to control the details or at least to stimulate the fear response. I see nothing like that here.

If I didn't know any better, I'd say that Tris just manipulated the simulation to save her life, turn Peter into an accomplice, and rescue me, too. How is that possible? And if she can control the simulation like that, why is she still trapped in it?

I lean back in the chair, pinching the bridge of my nose. The brain scan records are running in a separate window, so I pull those up, too. We didn't have that kind of imaging in Dauntless, so I'm not sure what I'm looking at. The activity lines are moving, and I wonder what the peaks and valleys correlate with.

I move back and forth through the last few minutes of the simulation. One of the lines jumps whenever Tris is running or getting shot at, so that must be the heart monitor – her heart rate is reacting in real life to the physical situation in the simulation. Makes sense.

The brain activity is a little harder to interpret, but it appears that the highest activity is when anyone in the simulation is making a decision – anyone, not just Tris. Interesting. I can see that it lights up one large region of the brain – I know it's not the amygdala, which is what we usually stimulate for the fear landscapes, but I'm not sure what it is.

There's generally a different pattern when she's focusing on me. Not always, really just when she's touching me or kissing me. The indicators surge, but a different, smaller region of her brain lights up, and very brightly. I smirk as I wonder if that means she has a Tobias section of her brain. Almost like a neurological blush. Or perhaps something a little more carnal than a blush? Ah, well, that thought is certainly lighting up a particular part of my anatomy, I think ruefully. Doesn't take much. How can I think about _that_ when my girlfriend is lying in a coma, having a near-death experience?


	6. Chapter 6

Just then, I hear shots and shouts in the distance. I pause the simulation and am at the door in two long strides, gun in hand. I peer cautiously out; the hallway is completely empty.

There are other computers in the room, so maybe I can bring up the surveillance system and see what's happening. If the assault is failing, I'm going to need to get Tris out of here.

I lock the door and drag a tall, heavy cabinet in front of it, just in case someone with the combination tries to get in. I find a weapons locker – the key flutters in the open door. They were so overconfident. Book smart isn't always all that smart. I tuck two more guns in my waistband, lock up the rest and pocket the key.

I don't have to work too hard to get into the surveillance system – two of the computers already have it on screen. One shot is of my cell – it's empty, door ajar.

Another window shows Control Rooms A and B – what's left of them. A smoking heap of metal, glass, and wire. The traitors were certainly thorough.

Down in the lobby, the battle is raging, a heaving tangle of bodies, gunfire, and smoke. It is impossible to tell which faction is which, with loyal Dauntless, traitor Dauntless, and reformed Dauntless, crossover Erudite, and factionless, all fighting with and against each other. In other parts of the building, I seek a few panicked Erudite running through the corridors, but no one who appears to be heading this way.

But I may not have much time.

I go back to Tris – she's still sleeping, stretched out on the metal table. I kiss her on the temple and turn again to the computer screen, tapping a key. Peter, Tris, and I are hiding in a building, under a stairwell. It wasn't exactly easy for us to escape Erudite, but it wasn't all that hard, either. Again, I wonder why that's not tipping Tris off that this is a simulation.

"Why did you do it?" she asks Peter. "You _want_ me dead. You were willing to do it yourself! What changed?"

"I can't be in anybody's debt, okay? The idea that I owed you something made me sick," he bursts out.

The shock shows openly on our faces as Peter explains that he lives by a rather extreme Old Testament code, in which he takes "an eye for an eye" quite literally.

It's a pretty good explanation for what might have motivated Peter to act, but it's a little too good. It took too much planning and too much risk for someone like Peter, whose highest priority is always going to be self preservation. He would not be willing to get on Jeanine's bad side at this point, even to satisfy his perverse moral code. Then again, I can't pretend I know what would be realistic for a sociopath.


	7. Chapter 7

Tris nods off, and the screen goes dark. I skip through her naptime, and see we're walking into the Abnegation sector. It appears that there was a little bit of a narrative gap there, as if the simulation itself fast forwarded, but Tris does not notice.

She winces a little, and hops awkwardly over a rough patch of pavement. I see that we both have bare feet, though Peter has shoes. Our feet must be wrecked, given the shattered landscapes we've been running through, ever since we escaped from Erudite. But we walk on – I don't even register discomfort.

I worry that Abnegation will be deserted, and I will have to watch the memories of her dead parents and traitorous brother haunt Tris. But the streets are increasingly busy as we move deeper into the quarter, everyone staring at us as we pass.

It's almost as if the vision I tattooed onto my skin has come to life, borne of tragedy. The remnants of Abnegation are mixing with the factionless, and there are refugees from Erudite and Candor, too. I don't see any Amity, but there couldn't be so many people here without cooperation from the Amity. They would all be starving.

We may have to come up with a new symbol for the factionless – I wouldn't want anything to be missing back there. Or maybe, I think more seriously, we need a symbol for unity.

There are Dauntless in the picture, too – specifically, our friends, who are probably all in the lobby downstairs right now, risking their lives for us. For each other.

I watch Christina and Uriah on the screen, as I hover protectively over Tris. Christina told me before I left for Erudite what Tris said to her, her hunch about Marcus. Christina sobbed then, saying she suspected what Tris was going to do and should have tried to stop her. At first, I was inclined to agree and started to say so, which even for me would have been harsh. But I understood how important it was to Tris to have her best friend back, and I told Christina so. She knows I'm not the type to say something just to spare her feelings, so it clearly did make her feel better. It really mattered to Tris that she had someone she could trust with her most important and dangerous secret.

Because she sure couldn't trust me, could she? I wouldn't even listen to her theory about what the Abnegation knew, and what might be outside the fence. I couldn't stand to hear her take Marcus's side.

Speaking of the devil, in the simulation, we've just gone into my father's house, of all things, which appears to be occupied by my mother and a band of factionless. We go upstairs, and the simulation accurately portrays which of the two bedrooms was mine. OK, not all that hard – all Abnegation houses are basically the same, and Marcus wasn't the type to allow any deviation.

"What's this?" Tris says, picking up a blue glass statue. Yes, what is that? I've certainly never seen it before.

"My mother smuggled that to me when I was young. Told me to hide it," I explain in the simulation. "The day of the ceremony, I put it on my dresser before I left. So he would see it. A small act of defiance."

I sit bolt upright. There is no glass statue in my room. My mother never gave me anything to remember her by. I pause the simulation and go back, looking carefully at the indicators. When the statue appears, just for a moment, the brain scan spikes, higher than I've seen it go, and the broad front region of Tris's brain lights up. As soon as I explain what the statue is, the indicators drop back down into more normal activity.

I stare at the screen, fingers steepled against my chin, hope flaming in my chest. Could it be that she just fought the simulation?


	8. Chapter 8

I press my palms to my eyes, trying desperately to figure out what that means. This glass statue is the best clue I've had so far, and I have no idea how to follow it.

I resume the simulation, hoping for more insights, but all thoughts of anomalous statues are wiped from my mind. I see myself, crouching in a bathtub, gently swabbing blood and dirt from Tris's feet. There's nothing stern or forbidding about me now, that's for sure. The scene is unmistakably charged, as Tris caresses my hands, lathering them with soap.

We are…cleaning each other. That might seem a strange thing to do for most people, but it's very, very Abnegation. I frown – in fact, it all fits so neatly together, that Tris and I would travel down this road together, not only sharing intimacy in a way that would be comfortable for two people raised in Abnegation, but also washing away all the sins and shame of this war for each other.

It dawns on me that in both real life and the simulation, Tris has tried to hint at just how much she feels at fault. She will say later in her simulation, in that same room in my father's house, that she still can't hold a gun. Not since she shot Will with one and watched her father and mother die in a hail of bullets. I knew she felt bad about that, but not that bad. It's not a feeling I share right now – for all my dread about having to shoot an innocent person, putting a bullet into Eric's brain was not that hard.

That train of thought is completely derailed when I see the two of us on screen, dripping wet, embracing.

"My family is all dead, or traitors; how can I…" Tris chokes out.

"I'll be your family now," my voice is rich and sensual, definitely not rumbling. Not so Abnegation anymore.

"I love you," she says. I'm about to pause and replay that when the virtual me actually asks her to say it again.

"Tobias, I love you," she says more firmly.

"I love you, too."

Her hands slip under the hem of my shirt, and up my back, and I pull my shirt off. She runs her fingers lightly across each of my tattoos as we kiss gently, and then more urgently. She pulls back, her hands moving down my chest, across my abdomen, stopping at my belt.

"I'm not afraid of what I want anymore," she whispers.

And then the screen goes dark.

I know I haven't moved at all, and my mouth is hanging open. I have to replay the scene several times, just because I've waited so long and wanted so much to hear her say those things to me.

Well, she'll never have the chance to say them in real life if I don't stay focused, I scold myself, shaking my head vigorously and trying to clear my thoughts. I replay the scene again, and this time, I try to maintain a clinical distance, watching the brain scans. Throughout the encounter, that small region of her brain is illuminated, and her amygdala is flickering, too. But when she tells me she loves me, that frontal region flares, and the amygdala goes quiet. She appears to fall asleep after that, very abruptly.

Just then, the door to the lab bangs open into the cabinet. Stupid! Stupid – I've let myself get too absorbed in the simulation.

I jump up, pulling the headphones off and a second weapon out of my waistband.

"Four!" someone is shouting. It's Leo. "Four! Are you in there?"

I look at the surveillance screen and see from the camera in the hallway that Leo is with two heavily armed Dauntless traitors or the Dauntless formerly known as traitors – whatever they are now. And he's with two women – one Erudite, and one Dauntless. I can't tell if she's a traitor or loyal.

"What do you want, Leo?" I shout.

"I brought you some help," he says. I'm about to express doubt, to put it mildly, when I get a good look at the Dauntless woman's face.

It's Christina.


	9. Chapter 9

_**Thanks for the reviews! JLG - that's a compliment that will stay with me for a very long time... **_

I tuck one gun back under my waistband and keep the other in hand as I heave the cabinet out of the way with my shoulder. Christina is first through the door, hurling herself into my arms, shaking and gasping. Then she pushes me away, holding me at arm's length and frowning.

"You look terrible!" she blurts out. "What the hell did they do to you?" She turns on her heel and glares at Leo and the other Dauntless.

"Did you do this to him? Did you?" She shoves Leo hard, but before he can say anything, she whirls around to me again. She's opening her mouth to say something else when she sees what's behind me on the table and freezes, her hand halfway to her face.

"Is she…"

"She's OK," I say quietly. "Well, not OK, but alive. Just unconscious – you can go see her." Christina charges over to the table.

I look at Leo, who shrugs at me, smiling wryly. "Gotta love Dauntless women," he remarks. He comes over and grasps my fist in his, giving me a rough half hug, much to my surprise.

He does not apologize for beating me or keeping me captive, nor do I expect him to. I do not thank him for helping me escape, either. The other two guards, who offer that their names are Darius and Sam, clap me on the back, too.

"How is she?" Leo says, forehead wrinkling with concern.

"I don't know," I respond slowly. Leo did help me escape and did capture Jeanine, but do I really trust him now? Can I ever see him as an ally?

"I know it's hard," the Erudite woman says softly, watching me intently. She looks so familiar. "But we have to learn to trust each other again, or there really is no hope."

"You're Cara," I suddenly realize. She's the one who risked her life to warn all of us about the attack on Candor. And, if I recall, she is Will's sister.

She looks at me expectantly, and after a brief hesitation, I nod.

Leo suddenly slumps against the wall, and I notice that he's wounded. Darius and Sam rush to help him into a chair as he shakes his head at them. "I'll be fine. I'll be fine. Dari, I need you to stay here, keep an eye on the monitors and the door."

"Sam," he says wincing. "Go to the cell we put Jeanine in and make sure she doesn't get out – and that no one gets in. Be careful." Sam nods and promptly leaves.

I glance back at Tris and up at the real-time screen. She's still asleep, and Christina is leaning over her, running her hand over Tris's hair and talking to her quietly.

"Let me see," I say looking at the blood soaking through Leo's jeans.

"I'll take care of it," Cara says briskly, pushing me out of the way. "Pants off," she orders Leo.

He raises his eyebrows at her and glances at me.

"I'd do what she says."

Cara rolls her eyes at us, but is all business when she sees the deep slash down Leo's leg. "Four," she says, pointing across the room, "there should be a first aid kit along the other wall – can you get it?" I nod as she applies pressure to the wound.

Leo is closing his eyes, his face pale.

"Now, tell us while I work on him," Cara says, pulling supplies from the kit. "Tell us what happened to her – and what you've figured out so far."

Christina looks over her shoulder at me, listening, but does not move from Tris's side.

I clear my throat and rub my fingers across my scalp – I'm not sure what I have figured out, or what to say first.

"Just start talking," Cara says. "Don't worry about making sense right now – just talk."


	10. Chapter 10

"I thought she was dead," I begin slowly. "That's what they told me, that they had moved up the day of her execution." I look over at Leo, his teeth clenched and his eyes closed, as Cara stitches the wound in his thigh.

"That's what _you_ told me," I clarify. He nods slightly, without opening his eyes.

"Jeanine said she had gotten all she was going to get from Tris, and that she would just use you instead." Leo pauses as Cara jabs the needle roughly into his skin.

He inhales and holds his breath for a moment. "I walked her to this room," he says faintly. "And she held her head up, uncompromised, refusing to show fear." He barks out a laugh, jarring his leg, and Cara shoots him a dirty look.

"You need to hold still, unless you want to bleed to death," she notes coolly.

"She even opened the door for herself," Leo continues, not moving this time. "This tiny girl, who had been tortured and everything she loved taken from her, and she actually opened the door."

"I thought – I knew – that it was wrong. We were wrong. It was just not Dauntless for us to be sending this girl to her death in some sterile laboratory. To be helping Jeanine...Everything she was doing was corrupt, and cowardly."

"Tris made you feel ashamed," I say without emotion.

He opens his eyes and looks right at me.

"She did more than that," he says, quietly. "She reminded me, and everyone who was here that day, who we were. Who we all wanted to be when we chose Dauntless."

"And so did you," he adds, closing his eyes and leaning back against the wall.

"I promise you, none of us who were here that day will forget again." He gestures weakly at me to continue.

Just then, the overhead screen starts to flicker. The activity lines quiver.

"What's happening?" Christina demands, staring nervously at the screen.

I rush over to the table. "She's in a simulation," I say hurriedly. "Jeanine said she's been in it for three days and can't get out – she may never get out."

"She trapped in a fear landscape?" Christina whispers, looking horrified.

"No," I say thoughtfully. "I don't think it's a fear landscape. Not exactly. This is something else."

The screen is still flickering, colors coming into view, as if Tris is waking up slowly, stretching and yawning.

"That screen" I point at the overhead, "is showing what she's seeing right now. And that screen," I say, pointing at the computer without taking my eyes off the overhead, "has data files from the last three days on it."

"How much have you watched so far?" Cara asks.

"Oh, um, about a day," I respond, flushing, as I remember what I was watching when they got here. I look over at Cara, who appears to have finished with Leo and is looking back at me, one eyebrow up, a little quirk at the corner of her mouth. "And some of today, just before she fell asleep," I rush on.

"I take it you saw yourself," she observes, chuckling at my discomfort.

Tris comes into view on the screen, stumbling to the bathroom. I make a move for the headphones as I see Tris take off her clothes and step into the shower.

"No, Tobias," Cara says sharply, raising her voice. "Let Christina keep an eye on Tris. You need to tell us the rest."

Anger and resentment rise in my chest as I look at her coldly. She does not get to give me orders and she will not keep me from Tris.

"Tobias" Leo says evenly. "We're with you, man." There's a gray cast to his skin. _You don't always have to fight so hard, _I can almost hear him saying.

In the simulation, Tris is in a different Abnegation house now, and she's with, of all people, Christina, who appears to be giving her a makeover. A makeover?

Well, I might not care what Cara and Leo want me to do, but I do care what Tris wants. And I am certain, looking at the screen, that Tris wants Christina to be with her right now. It can't be a coincidence that she suddenly has a starring role in the simulation.

Resigned, I hold the headphones out to Christina, who takes them eagerly.


	11. Chapter 11

"I think I need to rest," Leo mutters, right before his eyes roll back in his head and he pitches off the chair. Darius, who has been pacing in the hallway, rushes into the room and crouches anxiously over Leo.

Cara takes his pulse. "He'll be okay, she reassures Darius. "Help me turn him over for a second." She takes a syringe out of the first aid kit, yanks Leo's boxers down, and gives him a shot.

"It will fight off infection," she says primly to Darius, who shrugs and checks the surveillance screens before heading back to sentry duty. Cara does take a good look at Leo before she covers him back up. Maybe not so prim after all. We make eye contact and it's my turn to smirk and raise an eyebrow at her. She shrugs her shoulders, smiling sheepishly.

"Now," Cara says, stepping over Leo and wiping her hands on her jeans, "tell me what you've observed and give me your hypothesis. I can tell you have one."

I lead her over to the computer and pull up the data files. "This is not like the simulations we ran in Dauntless," I explain, slipping into instructor mode. "For those, the computer code was linked with transmitters in the serum. The simplest programs just stimulated the amygdala, but for the final test, the program was more complicated. We would take the data generated from the initial fear responses and program them into a fear landscape – a mental obstacle course of all your worst nightmares."

"So your success is judged by how well you master your fears?" Cara asks.

"No, not really," I respond. "Your success is judged by how well you master yourself. I'm not sure anyone really overcomes fears," I muse, "except perhaps with the passage of time."

"And that just probably brings new fears."

That's certainly been my experience, I think. In my last trip through my fear landscape, there were some changes, and they were not necessarily for the better. I start, as I realize something…

"What is it?" Cara asks, leaning eagerly toward me.

"Nothing really…"

"Tell me."

"It's just… My fears that are about conditions, they haven't changed much." She looks confused. "I will always be afraid of heights," I wave my hand dismissively. "But my fears about people, about me in relation to people – those change."

"I doubt that's relevant," I add, shrugging.

"I bet it is," she counters. "We see patterns and make connections, even when we don't consciously realize it, you know. Did Tris have many fears?"

"No – only seven. I only know of one person with fewer in recent Dauntless history. And, as you know, simulations don't work on Divergent – we usually know we're in one and can break out. Tris generally defeated the simulations in 2 to 3 minutes or less. That's unheard of."

Christina starts laughing. She turns and grins at us, pointing up at the screen. "I'm totally hilarious!" she shouts over the headphones.

I look up, startled to see Tris and Christina in brightly colored dresses and lipstick, riding in a truck with _Marcus_. I feel my eyes narrowing.

Christina rolls her eyes, "Oh, relax. Marcus, or 'Destroyer of Lives,' as I just called him, is on some kind of mission with us to Amity."

Cara snaps her fingers at me. "Focus, Four."

I give my head a little shake and turn back to the computer, starting the recorded simulation where I left it, moving past the sleep time. There's another shot of Tris getting out of bed and dressed. I try not to stare at her image, especially when she strips down to shower.

Pointing to the brain scans, I say "I know we usually stimulate the amygdala for fear landscapes, but that doesn't seem to be the focus of activity for this simulation – it's this region," I sweep my hand over the front part of the image.

"That's the prefrontal cortex," Cara says promptly.

"And sometimes here," I point at the "Tobias" section of her brain.

Cara squints at the screen. "Orbitofrontal cortex."

"OK, and that means what?"

"In a nutshell, those are the command and reward centers of your brain."

On the computer screen, I see Tris has returned to my room, where Christina is waiting for her, holding the blue glass statue. I make a guttural huff of surprise and lunge for the controls.

"Watch, watch," I say excitedly. "I think there might be something about that statue!" I replay the scene, and sure enough, as soon as we see the statue in Christina's hands, the activity line spikes and the prefrontal cortex flares. It's over so fast, as soon as Christina puts the statue down, that you'd miss it if you didn't know where to look.

"What does it mean?" I ask Cara.

"I don't know. Yet. What do you think it means?"

"I think she's fighting the simulation," I answer.

"Does anything else seem to make her prefrontal cortex light up?"

"Pretty much when anyone is making a decision – anyone, not just Tris."

"And the orbitofrontal?" she asks, before I can even finish my last sentence.

I hesitate. "When she's with me," I mumble.

"How, with you?" Cara presses.

I sigh. "When she's touching me or kissing me, when we're being affectionate. Well…" I flush. Cara gestures impatiently. One time when we were…intimate…both areas illuminated."

"So what's your hypothesis, Four?" Cara says softly.

I am reluctant to tell her what I'm thinking, as though just the act of saying it out loud will make it true.

"Jeanine said that Tris is doing this to herself," I start, slowly. "I don't think this is a fear landscape at all - there's no code, no programming. I think this is a self-generating simulation, controlled by those other parts of her brain. Tris is creating the story, and she just self-corrects any inconsistencies that might suggest it's a simulation."

Cara nods, her eyes distant, as she thinks it through.


	12. Chapter 12

Leo groans loudly from across the room as he comes back to consciousness. "What hit me?" He mutters weakly.

"Morning, Sunshine," I respond dryly.

"Hey," he says, in a tone that makes me look away from the screen. He's still lying on the floor, but rolled over on his side. "There's something under the table."

He starts to pull himself forward to reach for whatever he's looking at when Cara stops him.

"Don't you dare rip those stitches open," she scolds him.

He props himself up on his elbow and scowls at her, but she scowls right back. "I won't sew you up a second time," she threatens.

The standoff is very brief. "Yes, ma'am," he grumps, but the corner of his mouth twitches with amusement.

I get down on my hands and knees and reach under the table, fishing out a notebook. Frowning, I flip it open.

_Day One_, it starts. _Subject shows no awareness of being in a simulation. Brain activity normal for distress situation; heartbeat rapid, but within acceptable range._

I thumb through the pages and see it ends abruptly on Day Three, and I realize what this is.

"This is a record of the experiment on Tris," I say, without inflection. "They're Caleb Prior's notes – I remember when he dropped it."

"I'll take it," Cara says, holding out her hand.

"Four," Christina calls to me. "Can you come over here?" She looks troubled.

"Go," Cara waves me away. "Leo, do you think you feel strong enough to help me? I want to look through the recorded simulation for patterns – two sets of eyes would be useful."

Leo nods, and I give him a hand up before I join Christina at Tris's table.

Christina unhooks one earphone from the headset and hands it to me. I stroke Tris's arm lightly before looking up at the screen, where she's wandering through an Amity orchard.

"Something weird just happened," Christina says quietly. I wasn't aware Christina was capable of doing anything quietly.

I nod encouragingly at her.

"She left me sleeping and went outside and ran into some kind of sunrise prayer group. They asked her to join them, and when this one lady touched her, all the brain scans started going crazy."

"Then the lady said something about being at peace," she continues, looking back at the screen as Tris enters the main greenhouse. "Tris said she didn't deserve that, something about what she had done."

My jaw clenches as Christina plows on. Why didn't I see how Tris felt? I could have helped her.

Or maybe she should have trusted me enough to ask for my help.

"The lady said something about gifts, and how you couldn't earn it. I didn't understand what she was talking about, but the brain scans went really crazy."

"Then what happened?"

"Nothing. She ran away into the orchards. Now she's in that meeting," she points at the screen.

I groan, remembering the last time we were in an Amity faction meeting.

"What are they doing?" Christina asks.

"Deciding not to help anyone," I say bitterly, "only they like to talk about it for a really long time before they all agree to do nothing."

"Why are the two of you in Amity?" I ask, keeping my voice casual.

Christina shoots me a sidelong glance. "With Marcus, you mean?"

She may be loud, but she isn't stupid.

"Tris thinks he's telling the truth that the Erudite killed the Abnegation over some secret information, and she wants to basically raid Erudite headquarters to get it back."

I roll my eyes and shake my head slightly.

"I believe her," Christina says simply.

"In the simulation, or in real life?"

"Both."


	13. Chapter 13

Christina and I stare at each other. "He's a liar. You can't believe anything he says," my voice is cold and I can't help myself. "He manipulates people and hurts them for his own end. And he's very good at making people believe in him."

"This is not about you, Tobias."

Tobias. She called me by my name. Did Tris tell her? Why would she do that?

"Oh, really? And how do you know it's not about me? Just because Tris told you my real name doesn't mean you know anything about me."

Christina looks at me strangely. "_You_ told me," she snorts. "Along with everyone in Candor and half of Dauntless. Remember?"

Oh. The truth serum. Right. I am mumbling something about how I was trying to forget that when Christina leans in, close to my face. I try not to recoil at the proximity.

"It's not about you, Tobias," she repeats. "And you don't deserve her if you don't understand the courage it took to do this without telling you, even in a simulation."

"Well, you'll have to forgive me if it seems more like a betrayal than bravery."

We glare at each other for a moment, and then Christina makes a sound of disgust in her throat and turns away. "I'm going to watch now, to see if there's anything I can do to help Tris," she says pointedly.

I look away from her, over at Cara and Leo, watching them for a few minutes. They lean their heads together, murmuring and pointing at the screen. Cara looks down at Caleb's journal every now and then. Across the room, Darius is scrolling through different camera views. He looks intent and alert, but not especially worried.

I sigh and turn back to the big screen, hesitating slightly before giving Christina's shoulder a squeeze, a tacit apology. She pats my hand, never taking her eyes off the picture.

"The Amity leader…" she notes.

"Johanna," I supply.

"She just broke with her faction because she said she couldn't stand by as people lost their lives. Lots of brain activity when it happened. Hey! Check that out! Cara, you just showed up!"

"Yes, I rather thought I might," she says, without taking her eyes off the screen in front of her. "What am I doing?"

"You're telling us our plan is flawed, of course. But you're helping us, anyway."

"And how am I acting toward Tris?"

"Oh, a little frosty, but you're talking to her, and you're helping her. Now you're saying something about the data network, where Erudite can access computers from all the other factions."

Cara turns to look at us, her eyebrows shooting up. "Really? I said that? Now, how would Tris know about that?"

"Probably from me," I say. "I worked in the Control Room at Dauntless, and I'm good with computers. I told her a little about how it works and how I was able to find the Erudite attack plans on the Dauntless computers.'

Cara looks at me, shock and respect mingling on her face. "Well, you are full of surprises, aren't you, Four?"

"Leo!" Darius says urgently, staring at the computer screen. "We got trouble. Sam's in trouble."

Leo and I move to Darius's side. One of the cameras shows a group of about eight factionless and Dauntless, crouching behind a corner down the hall from Sam, shooting at him. He's holding his own, but probably not for long. I'm not sure, but I think one of the Dauntless might be Tori.

Leo nods grimly: "Let's go," he says to Darius. He turns to Cara, who has glided silently to his side, and puts his hands on her shoulders. "I think you may be the bravest Erudite I've ever met," he says quietly.

"And you may be the smartest Dauntless I've ever met."

Leo suddenly pulls her into his arms and kisses her soundly on the mouth. I expect her to swat him away and scold him, but she doesn't. She wraps her arms around his neck and presses her body into his, kissing him back even harder.

"Leo…" Darius says urgently.

Leo pulls back from Cara and they look at each other for a moment longer. She nods gently and strokes his face. He lets her go, turning away, and I clear my throat, moving to follow him.

"Where are you going?" Leo says, looking at me.

"Coming with you, of course."

He grips my shoulder with one hand. "No, Four. You have to stay here. I think Cara has figured it out, and you're the key to the whole thing. You can't leave now if you want Tris to survive this – and we may need her if we're all going to survive. We'll be OK."

"I'll go," Christina says, holding her hand out for my gun. Leo nods and follows Darius out the door.

Christina's gaze never wavers as she waits for the gun. I give her all three. As she starts to run after Leo and Darius, I call after her.

"Christina," she looks back over her shoulder at me. "You're a good friend. To both of us."

She grins at me. "Aw, who knew you could be such a softie, Four? Don't worry. I'll be back – you can't get rid of me that easily." And then she's gone.


	14. Chapter 14

_**Thanks for the reviews! Yes, sometimes I do write really fast - a little too fast. 14 and 15 were wayyyy too talky & clunky! Sorry about that - edited them a bit... I promise after 14 and 15 there will be more action! First fanfiction - learning the ropes...**_

Cara is already back at the computer, looking at the screen, at Caleb's journal - at anything but me. I understand. What just happened between her and Leo is something too new, too visceral, for her to talk about. She wants to protect it for the moment, like a just-lit match that needs to be shielded from the wind. If I did say something, it would just be to tell her that I really do understand.

Instead, I head over to the weapons locker, taking out three guns for myself and one for Cara. I put it on the shelf next to her without waiting to see if she takes it.

Back on screen, Tris is riding in a pickup truck, out of the Amity orchards and into the city, with people I don't recognize. They must be Amity or part of Cara's group.

As the truck comes to a stop, a young man with glasses and an open, friendly face winks at Tris and says, "Come on, Insurgent."

"What?" she asks, sliding down the side of the truck. The man starts handing everyone blue clothes out of a bag.

"Insurgent," he says, "Noun. A person who acts in opposition to the established authority, who is not necessarily regarded as a belligerent." Definitely Erudite.

The discussion continues as they all start stripping off their candy-and-sunshine Amity clothes. Tris hesitates.

"No time for Modesty, Stiff," Christina barks out. I like it that she cares about Tris but never coddles her.

Tris gets a hint of that look she gets in her fear landscapes, right when she's about to shatter glass or summon rain. All she does is change her clothes, though. Then again, I would not be comfortable changing my clothes in front of other people, either, so I guess I am not suprised that her brain scan pulses lightly.

"Did she just call you 'Stiff'?" the Erudite man asks her.

"Yeah," Tris responds. "I transferred into Dauntless from Abnegation."

"Huh." he responds, looking thoughtful. He certainly is paying a lot of attention to her. Jealousy lances through me, even though I know it's irrational. He may not even be a real person. "That's quite a shift," he continues. "That kind of leap in personality is almost genetically impossible these days."

"Sometimes personality has nothing to do with a person's choice of faction. There are many factors to consider." Tris could be talking about herself, me, or her father, but I somehow know she is thinking about her mother, a Dauntless-born Divergent who transferred to Abnegation for her safety.

A touch on my shoulder makes me jump. Cara motions to me to take the headphones off and then does a double take as she sees herself on screen. In the simulation, she just pinned Tris's hair back with a silver clip - and the brainscan flared.

Cara furrows her brow. She reaches over and unplugs the headphones so the audio plays from speakers into the room.

"Do you want one?" Christina says, holding out a gun to Tris. "Or would you rather carry the stunner?"

Standing next to me, Cara starts talking softly, and I lower the volume of the audio slightly. "Before I left, I was the top brain researcher in Erudite..."

I look at her in surprise, interrupting her, "Don't you think you could have mentioned that before?"

"Would it have made any difference to you if you knew?" she responds pointedly.

"In my research, one of the things I discovered is that the genetic brain... map... if you will... that we're each born with can be shaped by our environment."

She's talking very fast now, watching the screen out of the corner of her eyes. "Tris was born Divergent, with a unique mix of traits - she is highly intuitive and most comfortable when she is in control of the situation around her. But she was raised in Abnegation, and the only control you're allowed to have is of yourself. I imagine that's not especially tolerable to someone like Tris, so I'm not surprised she transferred."

"But growing up in Abnegation shaped her, too. That self control, the lack of any need for positive reinforcement - those became actual physical changes in her brain. I looked through your records, too, and you have a strikingly similar pattern," she notes. "And I suspect it is one of the explanations behind your father's…behavior."

"So what does that mean for her situation now?" I ask. I am not uninterested in the neurology lesson, but I don't want to talk about Marcus and I can feel on a gut level that we are running out of time.

"Look at the screen," Cara says, "and watch the brain activity." Oddly enough, as I look up, it's the virtual Cara speaking, too, who says: "The stunner is a perfectly good option. If you ask me, the Dauntless are too gun happy anyway."

The prefrontal cortex flares brightly and the activity lines jump.

"She's solving problems," Cara says simply. "That's what she does. Just now, she received the forgiveness she needed from me for killing my brother."

"What? When? I didn't hear you say that."

"No," she agreed. "That would not be credible. It had to be indirect. I am not a demonstrative person."

I raise my eyebrows at her.

"Usually," she concedes, her cheeks pink.

"But by putting the hair clip in earlier, by telling her it's acceptable not to want to touch a gun, I am communicating my forgiveness in a way that is authentic to me." Cara's voice softens, "and she is not wrong, either."

"About your personality or your forgiveness?"

"All of it," she says.


	15. Chapter 15

Cara clears her throat and continues. "Jeanine used Tris's strengths against her. She designed a serum that needs no code or a program because it's coming straight from the prefrontal cortex. It's like a self-sustaining fear landscape - Tris will just keep going until she masters herself. And that means either accepting or solving her challenges."

"Is she really going to be able to do that?" I say, with a sinking feeling.

"That's what worries me. There may be problems on her mind right now she can't solve, at least not by herself. The end result could be a permanent catatonic state."

"Translation," I snap.

"Trapped in her own mind and totally unresponsive to external stimuli."

"I don't understand," I say slowly, trying to ignore the fear rising in my throat, "why this would have been of interest to Jeanine. If all she wanted to do was disable the Divergent, she could have just killed us all. That would be easier than custom-designed mental prisons."

"You have to understand Jeanine," Cara says neutrally. "Jeanine believes she has the right to kill with impunity if she needs to, but prefers not to. It is inefficient. Better to control and make use of the Divergent."

"According to Caleb's notes, the next stage of the experiment was to add code to the purple serum. Caleb's hypothesis was that Tris was unusually resistant and he thought they could easily control other Divergent with a challenge serum. You were going to be the proof of principle. I gather a version of the attack simulation had worked on you for a little while, which Jeanine found very encouraging, and they had a test program set up for you. I destroyed it already."

I feel a chill down my neck and I clench my hands together tightly. "What was it?" I whisper hoarsely.

"You know what it was, Four," she says gently.

"They were going to make me kill Tris."

"Yes, and then yourself. The logic was that if they could make you do those two things, they could make anyone do anything."

"So are you telling me that this is hopeless? There's no way to get her out?"

"I'm not sure yet," Cara acknowledges, looking frustrated. "But I think we're going to have to try. I have a feeling we are running out of time to save her, whether the Erudite or the Factionless Alliance win control of this building," she says, walking over and covering Tris's hand with her own.

"What do you think we should do?"

"I think we should help her solve her unsolvable challenges."

I shake my head, ticking off the reasons that won't work. "First, we don't know what her unsolvable challenges are, since we can't actually hear her thoughts, and second, we don't know how to insert a program into this kind of simulation - and we don't know what it would do to her if we did."

"Leo and I sped up the footage and went through most of it, looking for patterns." Cara holds up Caleb's notebook. "And Caleb is actually  
quite helpful, whether he meant to be or not."

"So you think you know her unsolvable problems?"

"Yes," Cara says simply. "She's already resolved some, but I think there are three big ones left. First is Caleb and his betrayal. I don't know if she needs to understand why he did it or if she needs him to change his mind, though I don't think she would accept the latter as realistic. Second, obviously: what information did Erudite steal from Abnegation? She has ideas, but she can't close the gap between her hunches and reality." Cara hesitates.

"And third?" I ask, even though I already know what it is.

"You."


	16. Chapter 16

_**Any advice? Not too many reviews - would love any ideas about how to make this better!**_

Cara waits for me to say something, though not patiently. Her arms are crossed and her foot is tapping furiously. But her voice is surprisingly gentle when she finally says: "We don't have much time, Four."

"What do you think Jeanine did with the information she stole?" I ask her.

Cara looks at me in surprise - obviously not what she was expecting me to say. "Well," she muses, " I don't think she would have put it on the mainframe - too many people potentially would have access. Probably it's in her private lab. Yes, definitely, that's where it would be."

"Do you think you can get in?"

After a moment's hesitation, she nods firmly.

I walk over to a small refrigerator unit next to the metal table, where I saw Jeanine put the syringe of purple serum. I shoot the lock off and see rows and rows of the stuff.

I hold one up and shake it. "I am going to write a program to insert me into Tris's simulation, with the information you get from Jeanine's computer. I'll try to do something about Caleb, but I think we're just going to have to hope she figures that one out for herself."

"No, Four! It's too risky! What if I don't find anything? What if it doesn't work? You could both be trapped - you could be brain dead!" She's yelling at me, but I also see the guilty look in her eyes. What other options did she think she was putting on the table? But I decide not to point that out - it would be unkind, and maybe it's time for me to stop struggling so much with kindness.

We both jump at the sound of more gunfire. Whipping around, I see there's no one at the door, though. Cara taps my shoulder and points at the overhead screen with a shaking hand. The Erudite man with the open, friendly face, his glasses gone, is bleeding from what looks like multiple gunshot wounds. He clings to a ladder propped between two buildings. Christina reaches out a window for him, but he says, "Don't be an idiot - leave me," and then he falls. The horror and shock on Tris's face are all too real as she stares out the window.

"Cara," I say quietly, as I watch Tris stumble after Marcus on screen, "If I never come out of it, that's okay." I put one hand on her shoulder and force her to look me in the eyes. "Because I can't live without Tris, anyway. It's a chance I am willing to take." I give her a lopsided grin. "What, you don't think I can figure out how to be a better boyfriend? Have a little faith in me."

She embraces me tightly and says in my ear, "Tris has faith in you, you know that, right?"

"You can do this," I whisper back to her. "We can do this." She wipes the back of her hand across her eyes and nods resolutely.

"I'll wait as long as I can and keep an eye on the surveillance cameras," I say, " but I may have to go in before you get back. If that happens, I'm going to leave you a vial of serum, but I'm going to destroy the rest, ok? I'll write you a program to input whatever you find - if it's the real answer, it just might work."

I look at her until she makes eye contact again. "You can do this. You really are the bravest Erudite."

She smiles weakly.

"And you're just as resilient as I would expect a Divergent to be," she says softly, giving me one last, fierce embrace before she turns to go.

"Cara," I call after her, "take the gun." She looks at it distastefully, but in the end she takes it and runs toward the door. "Four," she says, one hand on the knob. "The important question now is - can you have faith in Tris, too? Because that's what she needs." She leaves without waiting for an answer.

Up on screen, Tris is back in this room, with Cara and Marcus working at the computer screens. She is just watching them, in a daze, when she sees Caleb walk into the room.

"What are you doing here?" he says to Tris.


	17. Chapter 17

I walk over to Tris's table and stroke her hair, watching her face as I listen to her argue with Caleb on the screen.

She still shows no sign of what is going on inside her brain - her eyes are not moving behind the lids, her body is utterly still. I sigh and kiss her on the forehead. "Make Caleb explain himself," I whisper to her. "Don't go easy on him."

There's a special computer at Dauntless headquarters for encoding serum, and after a search around the lab, I find one. I crack my knuckles like a musician ready for a concert and sit down, tapping a key to wake the computer.

The system is password protected, of course. First, I try my Administrator's password for the Dauntless computer, but that doesn't work. Sometimes the easiest answer is actually the right one - usually after I've gone through all the tough ones, of course. Not this time, though.

I start going through all the hacking tricks I know. The screen tells me I will have 10 tries before I'm locked out, so I consider carefully and key in methodically. On the 8th try, I'm starting to sweat, when the computer accepts the password.

A sigh of relief is just escaping my lips when I hear Tris yell on the screen: "You could have tried, you coward!" Her face is flushed and there are tears in her eyes as she confronts her brother. "Tried and failed, because you love me!"

I watch her for a second, frowning. Interesting. She actually is making Caleb explain himself, and none too gently.

"Four!" Someone yells from down the hall. I jump up and open the door, looking out in the hall at Leo and Uriah dragging an unconscious Darius between them. Christina is limping behind them.

I help them get Darius in and lie him on the floor carefully.

"What happened?" I ask Leo, gripping Uriah's shoulder, grateful to see him alive and apparently unharmed. He grasps my arm in return. Leo keeps his eyes on Darius as Christina brings him the first aid kit. She crouches awkwardly next to him, wincing and sticking her leg out to the side.

"That nutcase, Edward," she explains when she sees me looking at her in concern. "Shot me in the leg." She smiles grimly. "But I got him back. Shot him, too, and poked him in the eye for good measure - his good eye." Uriah helps her treat her own wound while Leo looks Darius over.

"Where's Cara?" Leo suddenly says.

"She went to Jeanine's lab to get the Abnegation file."

"You sent her alone?" he growls, rising to face me.

"There wasn't much choice. I had to stay with Tris - and there's no time, is there? Are the Factionless in control of the building yet?"

Leo stares at me, giving the barest of nods.

I go to the surveillance screen to check on Cara. "There she is," I say nodding at the screen. She's standing in the open doorway to Jeanine's lab, arguing with someone.

It's Caleb Prior, and he has a gun pointed at Cara. Leo takes in the scene over my shoulder.

"Do you have any more weapons?" he asks quietly. I hand him the two guns tucked into my waistband. He throws one to Uriah, who catches it smoothly, rising to his feet.

"Take care of Darius for me," Leo says, heading for the door. "I've already lost one of my brothers today. I don't want to lose the last one I have." I look at Darius, startled, and realize for the first time that he has the same tight curls as Leo, the same stocky build.

Uriah hesitates before he moves to follow Leo. He walks over to the table and stares at Tris, taking her hand. "Come on, Tris," he whispers. "Come on, Divergent. You have to fight it." he puts her hand down gently. "You'll save her, won't you, Four?"

I nod, the muscles in my jaw tightly clenched. He nods back at me and runs after Leo.

Looking down at the surveillance screen, I wish Leo had stayed a little longer. Caleb just lowered the gun, shoulders sagging, and is following Cara into the lab.

"Do you need help?" I ask Christina, before returning to the encoding computer.

She shakes her head, "I have it," she says grimly, lifting Darius's shirt to reveal a crudely bandaged wound in his abdomen. "He's lost a lot of blood," she says. "But I don't think the bullet hit any major organs - doesn't seem to have internal bleeding. He was lucky. Go do what you have to do."

We both look up at the overhead screen as Tris shouts "Shut up!" Much to my shock, she is shoving Marcus into a wall. Christina makes a little gurgling sound of surprise, too. "I hate you, you know that!" Tris yells in his face. "I hate you for what you did to him, and I am not talking about Caleb." Warmth spreads through my chest, and I step closer to the screen. "And while I may not shoot you myself," she whispers to Marcus, "I will definitely not help you if someone tries to kill you, so you'd better hope to God we don't get into that situation."

I feel my eyes fill - I don't want Christina to see me cry, but I can't help myself. I keep my back to her as I walk to the metal table. "Thank you," I whisper to Tris, smoothing her hair back and kissing her on the forehead.

I wipe my face with the edge of my shirt and go back to the encoding computer to work.


	18. Chapter 18

_**There will be quite a bit of text from Insurgent woven into the rest of the chapters, so it's a good time to say again that this is Veronica Roth's story and her characters!**_

I type in silence for some minutes when I hear Christina say, over the clicking of the keys, "That's weird."

"What is?" I respond, without slowing down or looking up.

"Edward just shot me in the leg."

"Yeah," I say. "You already told me."

"No, I mean in the simulation," she says slowly. "He shot me in the leg in the simulation." We stare at each other.

"Do you think..." she starts, and then trails off, putting a cold compress on the bruised knot rising on Darius's temple. She bundles up her Dauntless jacket and puts it under his head, muttering "There's not much more I can do for him." Then she stands up stiffly, watching the screen.

I go back to the computer. "What happened to Jeanine?" I say softly, keeping my eyes on the screen in front of me. "In real life, I mean."

"She's dead," Christina says. "We got there too late. Sam couldn't stop them - he was dead, too, on the floor in front of the cell, by the time got there. He took a lot of them down with him, though," she notes approvingly.

"He was Leo's other brother?"

"Yeah," she says quietly. "Darius is the youngest. He's only a couple of years older than you are."

"We got in a firefight with them," she continues, "Uriah tried to get them to stop when he saw me, but the Factionless with him paid no attention to him."

"And Tori," she continues, though she sounds distracted, "it was like she was out of her mind, screaming, kicking, even biting. She kept yelling something about Eddie, whoever that is. We tried to stop her, but she killed Jeanine - stabbed her to death in the stomach, then ordered the Factionless to take the body down to the lobby to show everyone, and to kill us if we got in the way."

Christina gasps then and moans. I look over my shoulder in time to see Tris shoot Will. Wait, Will?

"What is going on?" I say, swiveling around to see the screen.

"She just had to kill herself and then...Will, again, in order to get into Jeanine's lab. Some kind of simulation." Christina frowns, "there's something not right about that."

"Having to kill Will again?"

"No," she says thoughtfully. "The whole sequence. It was unnerving, sure, but too...easy, I guess." Christina goes to check on Darius, looking back and forth between him and the screen. I return to my code.

Just a few minutes later, I hear Christina mutter an expletive. She's staring, wide-eyed at the screen. Tris is inside Jeanine's lab with Tori and Jeanine. Tris, pointing a gun at Tori, says, "all I'm asking is for you to trust me, please. There's something important, something only she knows the location of..."

I tear my eyes reluctantly from the screen and return to the work. But I listen to Tris and Tori argue, as the standoff between them continues.

"Nothing is more important than her death," Tori finally says.

"If that's what you insist on believing," Tris responds, her voice infused with regret, "I can't help you. But I'm also not going to let you kill her."

"I'm a Dauntless leader," Tori says, "you don't get to decide what I do."

Christina gasps again and says, "Oh my God, Four!"

I turn around in time to see Jeanine slump to the floor, Tori facing Tris with a knife in her fist. Her arm is covered in blood.

"Tori just stabbed her -_ in the_ _stomach," _Christina whispers. "She can hear us."

We are staring at each other, and I'm not sure if we're both trying to think about what that might mean, or if we're trying not to think about it. My mind is racing through the last day- days? I have no idea how long I've been in this room. But Tris has clearly been weaving events around her into her simulation. Christina and her makeover... Cara and her forgiveness... I told her to go after Caleb, and she did. And now Edward shoots Christina in the leg and Tori stabs Jeanine.

I frown.

"What are you thinking?" Christina asks.

"I think she is subconsciously grabbing some of the things happening in this room and adding them into her simulation, with one exception." I pause, thinking it over. "Me. Most of the parts when she was working things out with me happened before I got here. Since then, she actually lied to me so she could get me off screen and go off with you and Marcus. I haven't been in the simulation at all."


	19. Chapter 19

We both look up at the screen, and I think Christina nearly faints when we see Uriah show up on screen - with me. I feel a strange prickling heat ripple across my scalp and my vision telescopes out, as though I'm suddenly somewhere far away. I realize Christina is saying my name, her hand on my arm.

"Tobias," she says urgently, "you have to watch. She might be trying to talk to you." I shake my head a little and push her hand off my arm, stepping closer to the table.

On screen, I am taking the gun from Tris, her eyes desperate and hopeful. My face, however, is stone still.

"We found Marcus in the next room, caught in a simulation. You came up here with him," I say, my voice flat.

She tilts her chin up at me, meeting my flinty look without blinking. And in spite of everything, I smile briefly watching the screen. Defiant, as always, even when it's me.

The virtual Tobias is enraged, though, visibly shaking. "I trusted you," I spit out. "I trusted you and you abandoned me to work with him?" The combination of hurt and menace in my voice leaves me shaking in real life - this is how she sees me? This is how I am?

"Don't. Move." Christina whispers harshly to me, putting her hand on my arm again. I had taken a step toward Tris, reaching out for her. I turn a cold look on Christina, who returns it without flinching. "You need to hear what she has to say if you want to help her."

"It's not about you, Tobias." She said that to me earlier, when I first saw Marcus show up in Tris's dreams.

"He told me something," Tris says to virtual Tobias. "He told me something, and everything my brother said, everything Jeanine said while I was in Erudite headquarters, fit perfectly with what he told me. And I wanted - I needed to know the truth."

Screen Tobias is raising his voice at her now, his eyes hard and critical. "The truth. You think you learned the truth from a liar, a traitor, and a sociopath?"

Tori says something, but I am only hearing Tris now. I can't even bear to look at the man onscreen, because I recognize him all too well. I know I am capable of that, and more.

"I think...I think that you are the liar," Tris says, voice quaking at first but growing steady as the words tumble out. "You tell me you love me, you trust me, you think I'm more perceptive than the average person. And the first second that belief in my perceptiveness, that trust, that love is put to the test, it all falls apart." She is crying now, but pays no attention to the tears dripping off her chin. "So you must have lied when you told me all those things. You must have, because I can't believe your love is really that feeble."

Now the tears are dripping off my chin, too. But only here in real life. On screen, my face is once again a blank mask, my glittering eyes giving away my fury. She steps closer to me, her voice so low that only I can hear her on screen. Both Christina and I move closer to listen to what she's saying.

"I am still the person who would have died rather than kill you," she says. "I am exactly who you think I am. And right now, I'm telling you that I know, I _know_ this information will change everything. Everything we have done, and everything we are about to do." She stares up at me, urgently but not pleadingly, because Tris would never beg, not even me. But I do not move, except to look away, as though her gaze is too intense for me.

"Coward," I hiss at myself. I turn away, shaking off Christina's arm. I go back to the encoding computer and put a vial of the serum in the upload bracket. I can feel Christina's eyes on me as I carefully check through the code, adding some new details, based on what I just heard.

"If you want to do something useful," I say neutrally, "you could destroy the rest of the serum in that little refrigerator."

There's a long silence. "Okay," she says, "but I'm going to try something first." I glance over my shoulder and see her leaning over Tris, one hand on her forehead.

"Tris," she says, "you're in a simulation. It's a simulation. Think about it. Does it make sense? Are these things really happening to you?"

I tap the upload sequence, and watch as the system loads the transmitters into the serum. I don't know if this will work, but I hope if I inject us both with the same serum, it will push her into this new program with me, which has me saving her and waking us both up.

"Look," Christina says. On screen, Uriah has brought Tris to the main lobby of Erudite, to Christina.

Christina.

They update each other, but say nothing that indicates Tris heard Christina's message to fight the simulation.

Then I appear on screen, walking past Tris without even looking at her, and I grab Caleb from where he is cringing on the floor. "I want you to disarm the security system for Jeanine's laboratory," I say coldly, wrenching him to his feet. "So that the factionless can access her computer." I leave with Caleb, my face full of hard lines, never once looking at Tris - or anyone else.

Back in the lab, I turn back to the computer. The upload is nearly complete.

The sound of running feet, slapping against the hallway gets my attention, though Christina does not look away from the simulation.


	20. Chapter 20

Cara and Leo appear in the doorway - we didn't even bother to close the door when Leo left the last time, I realize. Uriah is close behind them with Caleb.

"We have it! We have it, Four!" Cara says breathlessly, while Leo crosses the room immediately to Darius's side. Uriah moves next to Christina, putting an arm around her and squeezing her shoulder.

"There's no time to add it into the serum," I tell Cara. "What does it say?"

"I don't know!" Cara exclaims, holding out a chip. "We didn't take the time to watch it - we just brought it here!"

I look at it thoughtfully, as I load the serum into two syringes. "Okay," I say, making a decision to trust Tris's hunch. "Go ahead and load it on the mainframe, and once I'm in, play it. Play it on every screen and every computer in the city."

"Are you sure?" Cara asks doubtfully.

"Tris is sure," I say. "And that will have to be good enough."

I stride over to the metal table with the syringes, but Christina puts a hand on my arm.

"No," she says, quietly but firmly. She takes my other arm and turns me to look at her. "No, Four. I just questioned that test sequence she had to go through to get into Jeanine's lab. In the simulation. And she got confused. All the scans spiked."

I try to pull away from her.

"Tobias," she says, holding me so hard her fingertips are leaving bruises. "It _really_ isn't about you. If you inject her with that, you will be trying to take control, trying to _make_ her do something. Even if it works, which I doubt, you won't be any different from that guy on the screen, and I know you didn't like what you saw."

I look away from her, at the two syringes in my hand. The room has gone quiet, except for Cara's tapping keys. On screen, Uriah starts shouting at an Erudite doctor, who shrinks from him, "Fix her! You can fix her, so do it!"

Lynn is lying on the ground, clutching her hands to her belly, blood welling through her fingers. Uriah argues with the doctor, who tells him there's nothing she can do, that she cannot fix Lynn. They've destroyed all the medical equipment, and there's nothing left that can help her.

"Uri," Lynn rasps from the floor, "shut up. It's too late."

I drop the syringes, and they shatter against the floor. I move to Tris's side, and she is the only thing I can see, the only one I can think about. I lean over and kiss her on the lips and stroke her hair. I'm not sure what to say.

"Remember, Four, don't worry about making sense right away," says Cara, who has silently moved to my side. "You know what you need to say - just start talking." I know that the others have grouped around me, too, and much to my surprise, it does not annoy me or constrain me to be surrounded by other people. By these people. It makes me feel stronger and more sure.

"Tris," I start, "I am so afraid, and you are so brave. I know I only have four fears, but they all add up to the same thing, and I can't beat it. It's the fear that masters me." I close my eyes for a moment, and then plunge on.

"Remember when I went back into my fear landscape that last time? Do you know what I saw? When Marcus came to beat me, I took the belt, like you did that time. I beat him, but when he looked up, he had my face. I became my father."

I lick my lips, which are dry and cracked.

"I don't know what it's like to be loved," I say hoarsely. "I have no idea how it would feel to have parents who loved me enough to take care of me, let alone die for me. I only know what it's like to be hurt and abandoned."

"That's not something you get past. Not quickly. Maybe not ever. And my greatest fear..."

My voice falters, and it's Leo's hand on my shoulder that steadies me.

"My greatest fear is that it's not good enough that I love you and you love me back. That I will hurt you somehow, like I just did in your dreams."

I pause again, hearing only the steady thrum of Tris's heartbeat over the buzz of the machines.

"I get it now," I whisper. "I understand. I can't control you. I can't keep trying to bend your will to mine. Not just because it's your greatest fear, but because it's also mine. I am afraid that if you let me control you, it will be the first step. Someday, when you won't do what I want you to, I will say something cruel. The next step."

The words are dragging out of me, as if each one is cutting my throat on the way up.

"And the next time you won't do what I say, I will hit you."

My hand is clammy against her forehead.

"And then I really will be my father."

I clear my throat and kiss her again on the forehead, my lips lingering against her cold skin.

"So..." I resume slowly, not sure what comes next, and then suddenly, I do. I know what I have to say. "So, if you love me, if you want us to be together - and believe me, it's what I want, more than I have ever wanted anything else - if you want to be with your friends, who are here in this room with me, if you really want to honor your parents," I pause, "and kick your brother's ass... If you want to live..."

"You need to save yourself. I do trust you and I do know who you are. You are the strongest person I know, far stronger than you think you are. And it's up to you to decide how this ends."


	21. Chapter 21

I'm not sure, but from the snuffling, gurgling sounds around me, I think everyone in the room may be crying. I know I am, the tears falling onto Tris's face. I wipe them gently off of her.

My voice really is rough and rumbling now. "Come back to me, Tris. Come back to us. Come back, and I swear I will spend my the rest of my life trying to be a better, braver man - for you, and for myself."

Cara slips away, probably back to the computer, while Christina, Uriah, and Leo press closer. We all look up at the screen. Evelyn is talking now, and it's clear she has taken charge. The Factionless are pointing their weapons at the huddled, beaten room of Erudite, Candor, and Traitor Dauntless. The Amity crouch among them, tending to the wounded. A few Abnegation mill around, looking lost, and there are Dauntless straining against the weapons aimed at them.

"The faction system that has long supported itself on the backs of discarded human beings will be disbanded at once," Evelyn commands, her voice surging around the room.

I stop listening and return my attention to Tris, murmuring encouragement, telling her how much I love her and brushing my hand lightly across her hair.

"It's ready to go," Cara says quietly, leaning over next to me. "Tell me when, and the file will play all over the city." She stands up, and I see Leo move behind her, putting his arms around her, burying his head in her hair. She leans back into him, and he kisses her neck gently before they both return their attention to the screen.

"You can do this, Tris," I say, brushing her lips with my fingertips. I start, because I think I saw her eyes move slightly under the lid.

"Tobias," Christina grips my shoulder urgently, nodding at the screen.

It's me. I'm back in the lobby. Here in the real world, my mouth hangs open when I see who is following me across the room. Marcus and Caleb. What does that mean?

Tris watches me walk toward her, focusing on my feet. I'm wearing black sneakers with chrome eyelets. I'm barefoot right now, and I don't own a pair of shoes like that, as far as I know.

Virtual Tobias crouches down, and I exhale noisily as I see his face - my face. My eyes are shining, and the lines at the corners of my mouth and eyes have softened.

"You were right. I do know who you are. I just needed to be reminded," I say, my voice deep and smooth. Back in the lab, Christina leans her head against my shoulder, shaking with relief, or tears, or laughter, I can't tell which.

"Almost time, Cara," I say quietly. "Get ready." Cara disentangles herself from Leo and moves to the computer.

In Tris's simulation, the screens in the Erudite lobby flicker on. I hear Cara's keystrokes across the room.

"What is this?" Evelyn demands on screen, and I'm almost tempted to turn around to make sure she's not actually at the door.

"This," Tris's projection of me says, intimately, never taking his eyes off Tris, "is the information that will change everything."

"You did it?" she says breathlessly.

"You did it," he -I? - responds, pulling her to her feet. "All I did was force Caleb to cooperate." I hear the real Caleb sigh.

Tris throws her arms around me, and we kiss, without reservations, with all the heat and longing of a new love, a lost love, a true love. And the brain scans flame with light, the pleasure and problem solving regions equally bright. The indicators jump frenetically.

I don't need to tell Cara it's time. She clicks a key. On all the computer screens in the room and after a slight delay, also on the screens in the simulation, a woman sitting at a desk appears.


	22. Chapter 22

"Hello," says the woman behind the desk. "My name is Amanda Ritter. In this file I will tell you only what you need to know. I am the leader of an organization fighting for justice and peace. This fight has become increasingly more important - and consequently, nearly impossible- in the past few decades. That is because of this."

The images that unfold are horrific. People dead, dying, in danger, from others who do not regard them with hatred, but with something far worse: indifference. It is unbearable in its cruelty, both because of the violence it shows and because of its similarity to the attack simulation that just decimated our own city.

"You do not remember any of this," she says. "But if you are thinking these are the actions of a terrorist group or a tyrannical government regime, you are only partially correct. Half of the people in those pictures, committing those terrible acts, were your neighbors. Your relatives. Your coworkers. The battle we are fighting is not against a particular group. It is against human nature itself- or at least what it has become."

I look at Tris stretched out on the metal table. Is this what she expected? It is certainly not solving anything, given that the terrible story this woman is telling us sounds uncomfortably like the one we are living through. But then I notice that Tris's eyes are definitely moving under her eyelids. I stop watching the screen.

I listen, watching Tris instead, as Amanda Ritter continues, "That is why you are so important. Our struggle against violence and cruelty is only treating the symptoms of a disease, not curing it. You are the cure."

Tris's brow wrinkles a bit. I tighten my grip on her hand.

Amanda Ritter continues, explaining that when we notice a new breed among us, which she tells us to call Divergent, it will mean we are ready to emerge from this engineered isolation. She says we will be more flexible. Flexible? What does that mean? Just that we have an aptitude for multiple factions? I don't understand how that will help.

How ironic, I think. We don't even know what she means, but with those words, she condemned the very saviors she hoped for. Amar, Natalie Prior, me, Tris - who knows how many others may have been hunted and eliminated because of Amanda Ritter's plans for peace. All for some kind of genetic breeding experiment gone wrong.

"I am about to join your number," she says, with a tired smile. "Like the rest of you, I will voluntarily forget my name, my family, and my home. I will take on a new identity, with false memories and a false history. But so that you know the information I have provided you is accurate, I will tell you the name I am about to take as my own." Her smile deepens to something that looks closer to actual happiness, and I realize when she does that, there's an echo of something familiar. "My name will be Edith Prior, and there is much I am happy to forget."

I grip Tris's hand hard. I realize that everyone else in the room is utterly still. Their world, as they have known it, just came to an end. Or did it ever really exist? Either way, it was already over, I think grimly. We killed it all on our own.

Not my world, I think fiercely. I still have a chance - it is here in my hand. I see that her eyes are still moving, but they are moving less - we are losing her. No. No - I can't let that happen.

"The statue, Tris," I shout raggedly. "Think about that blue glass statue - I never had one. It never existed. My mother never gave me anything. You made it up to try to break yourself out." I beckon to Christina to come closer. "Take her other hand," I beg her. "You help her remember."

Christina nods and reaches for Tris. "Think about that woman in the prayer circle in Amity," she says to Tris, wiping her hand across her face. "That gray-haired lady who took your hand, just like this? You added her in, too, to try to wake yourself up, didn't you? She was right, Tris. You do deserve peace. You do. And that's what Will would tell you, too. None of it was your fault, and it is selfish for you to think that."

Caleb has come up to the end of the table. I tense, because I don't know if he wants to help her, or whether he even can.

"Beatrice," he says softly. "I didn't want you to see this footage. I didn't want anyone to - I didn't want anything else to change." He hangs his head. "I still think you were wrong," I glare at him, "but so was I, and it cost us our parents. I loved them, too. I did. " He reaches out and touches her foot hesitantly. "But the important thing is that you need to come back now. You're Divergent, and you're supposed to save us."

He says it so faintly, I doubt she can even hear him, but I glance up at the screen hopefully. She is standing with me in the Erudite lobby, and there is chaos all around us. We are looking only at each other, our hands intertwined, as people scream, running in and out of the building. Some are weeping and writhing on the ground. Others are holding each other or standing mute with uncomprehending eyes. I wonder if that's really what it looks like downstairs right now.

Suddenly, on screen, I reach into my pocket, pull out the blue glass statue, and hold it out to her. Tris takes it from me, with a puzzled look on her face. She stares at it for a moment, and glances over at Christina, still sitting on the ground next to her. Christina nods and Tris abruptly hurls the statue to the floor, shattering it into a thousand glittering pieces that spray and shimmer around us.

On the table, Tris gasps, and her eyes snap open. She sits up suddenly, and the electrodes and cables pop off of her, pinging against the metal table and silencing the amplified heart. The screen goes dark.

_**That's it, folks! Hope you liked it... I'm going to go back and edit the first chapter, though, to slim it down. Could maybe continue beyond this point, if people want me to. But I didn't originally intend to - I meant this to be an alternate version of Insurgent. **_

_**The one reviewer who said that the point of the books was to celebrate mental strength, as opposed to physical strength - I guess I agree, but I'm not sure that's the point? Tris is really able to bust the simulations because she's out of pattern, outside the norm - and the twist is that while her society considers it a great evil not to fit inside the lines, it's actually a strength - the whole reason they're there.**_

_**Thanks so much for reading!**_


	23. Chapter 23

_**Thanks for the encouragement... I'll take a stab at more. Some wrap up and set up in the next couple of chapters, and then off we go...**_

For a minute that seems to last an hour, no one even breathes. Tris just stares straight ahead, wide-eyed. I decide to break the tension.

"Tris?" I say tentatively, touching her arm carefully.

She turns her body stiffly to look at me, and I think even my heart stops beating for a moment. She puts her fingers on my face.

"Tobias," she breathes. "I heard you. I heard your voice. You brought me back. You brought me back."

I groan and pull her into my arms, saying her name over and over. She is gasping, laughing, crying, her arms weak around me.

"When she put me on the table," she says pulling back to look at me, "when I thought I was going to die..."

"Shhh, Tris. You don't have talk about it now. There will be time for all of that."

"No, I want to. I need to tell you. You were right. You were right about me. When I was lying here, about to die, I realized that I had been all wrong. My parents, Will – I wouldn't have been honoring them by dying. Only by living. And then I realized it was more than that - I _wanted_ to live! I want to live, Tobias!" She is holding me by both arms, staring at me fiercely.

I cup my hand around her face, and she leans her cheek in, pressing her lips into my palm." You are very, very alive!" I say, a slightly hysterical noise bubbling up from my guts. Then I lean in to kiss her, and she throws her arms around me, kissing me back and sliding off the table into my arms. I cradle her against my chest, my arms under her knees and her arms around my neck.

Suddenly, she peeks over my shoulder, her eyes growing wide. "Ohhh," she exhales, as she realizes there are other people in the room.

It's all the permission they need. Christina and Uriah fold us both into their arms, laughing because they don't know what else to do. Tris is gulping air, saying thank you over and over.

Christina cuts straight to the chase, of course. "How much do you remember? Do you know what happened to you?"

Uriah punches Christina in the arm, hard. "Christina! Give the girl a chance to wake up!"

Christina shrugs unapologetically, rubbing the bruise Uriah just gave her. "Well?" she asks Tris.

"I...I'm not sure," Tris says. "I know I was in a simulation - but I'm not sure... I don't know..." She sees Cara some distance off, standing with Leo and watching quietly.

"I want to try to stand," Tris says to me. I nod and put her down carefully, keeping an arm around her waist as her knees buckle and she grabs the edge of the table.

"We'll help you sort through it, Tris," Cara says gravely.

Tris nods, her eyes filling with tears as she holds her hand hesitantly out to Cara. Cara comes over and takes Tris's hand, pushing a strand of hair gently off her face. "This part was real," she murmurs, and I know she's talking about forgiveness.

Tris closes her eyes and lowers her head, whispering, "thank you." She takes a deep breath. "Did Fernando really die?" she asks without looking up.

"No," Cara reassures her. "Well, not as far as I know," she adds, less reassuringly. "There really is a Fernando, and he did leave Erudite with me - he was at Merciless Mart after the attack. You must have met him there?"

Tris shrugs her shoulders helplessly, "I don't remember."

"Interesting," Cara responds. "You certainly seem to know him - how he was in your simulation is how he is."

"I know there's a lot to talk about," Leo breaks in, "but we should really get out of here." he turns to Cara, "Can you destroy the mainframe from here?" Her eyes go wide, but she purses her lips and inclines her head. "Anything we should keep?"

"Yes!" Tris all but shouts. "My simulation data, my brain scans - I want it all.". Everyone stares at her and she flushes when she realizes it. "They shouldn't know more about what's inside my head than I do," she mutters. "And it will help me sort out what's real," she adds more firmly.

Cara sits down at the computer and starts to work.

Tris eyes Leo warily. "I remember you. You brought me here to Jeanine, to my execution."

Leo does not look away. "Yes," he answers grimly. "Not very Dauntless of me."

"But then you helped us?" she asks in disbelief. Leo nods. "You helped me," this time it's a statement. He nods again, never breaking eye contact. Tris just looks at him steadily.

"I hope you will be able to forgive me – to forgive all of us," Leo says. "All the Dauntless – we belong together now."

"Oh yeah?" Uriah says calmly. He's examining the weapons locker, and smoothly catches the key I toss him. "And what makes you think you can speak for all the Traitor Dauntless?" Uriah is regarding the contents of the locker with satisfaction and begins passing out guns.

"I was elected leader when Max died," Leo says evenly. "I do speak for all the Dauntless here, and not just because I am their leader. None of us knew what we were signing up for – Max did not tell us everything, and none of us is proud of what we've done. I realize we have a lot of blood on our hands, and some of it is yours," he says, now looking at me, and I understand he is addressing me not as an Erudite victim, but leader to leader. "But I hope we can all go home together and rebuild. Go back to the Dauntless we were meant to be."

"Home," Uriah snorts. "And what does that even mean anymore?"

"Well, what do you want us to do, Uriah?" Christina asks impatiently.

"We have to go outside the fence, of course." Tris says calmly.


	24. Chapter 24

No one says anything for a long time. I realize belatedly that Tris is watching me, waiting to see if I will back her up.

"I think you're right," I begin. "We'll have to get a team of Divergent together." Tris looks at me gratefully, and I think maybe this trust thing won't be so hard after all. "Though our most immediate challenge is going to be downstairs, dealing with whatever is left of the factions."

Tris gives me a lingering kiss, and I can tell she's ready to stand on her own again. I put her down and join Leo at the surveillance screens. The scene in the lobby is still chaotic, a seething sea of mostly blue and black shirts. Tris never went to Amity in real life, so they are not present, and I assume Jeanine never had the chance to activate the next attack simulation, so the Candor are not there, either. We can see the muddy hues of the factionless blending into the crowd, though.

"Leo," I say quietly, "it's not up to me alone, but I agree with what you said."

He looks at me for a moment, his pale eyes still wary, but there's a hint of light in them now. It's much easier to forget the past when you think you might have a better future.

"Well, we might as well get started," he says, pointing at a corner of the image, where Tori, Harrison, and Evelyn are standing together, tension screaming through the screen. "Let's get down there."

"How's it going, Cara?" Leo calls out to her.

"Well," she says. "I've mirrored everything to the Dauntless computers and am running a program that should wipe the memory of every Erudite computer. It will take awhile to run, though." She hands Tris a chip and a book. "This is your data," she explains, "and this is from Caleb. He wanted you to have it."

Tris gasps and sways. I'm by her side, steadying her, in seconds. "He was really here?" she asks faintly.

Cara nods. "He thought it best that he leave. That's his journal of your simulation - it will help you understand what happened, and maybe it will help you understand him. About halfway through, he has a change of heart and starts writing to you directly.". She pauses. "We couldn't have gotten into Jeanine's computer without him."

Tris squeezes her eyes shut and hugs the book tightly to her chest.

"Oh, and he said to tell you that Edith Prior was your great grandmother."

We all stare at Tris. She opens her eyes. "I wonder why he thinks he knows that," she snaps. "because I sure don't."

Cara shrugs. "There are genealogical records in the Erudite system - maybe he looked at them." She turns to me, handing me a chip, too. "And this appears to be a record of all the known Divergent. Not all of them are dead."

She gets up and goes to Darius. "I'm going to take him to the hospital floor and hope there's a doctor there. Can someone help me carry him?"

No one says anything. I don't think any of us wants to leave Tris, and maybe we're not fully ready to help Leo and Darius just yet.

"Uriah," says Tris, "do you think you could help Cara?"

Uriah looks at her for a few seconds and then says, "I would do anything for you, Tris." He gives her a kiss on the cheek and turns toward Darius.

Tris has a small smile on her face, and her hand is on her cheek where Uriah kissed her.

He crosses the room, moving with the confidence of someone who knows he is handsome and has always been loved, at ease in his own skin. It is impossible not to like Uriah.

Will I lose Tris to him someday, or maybe someone just like him? He is everything I am not, and really, why would she want me, with all the burdens, I carry?

I am startled out of my misery by her hand on my chin, pulling me around to look at her. Her gray blue eyes are bright and thoughtful.

"I still don't understand why you chose me, Tobias" she says softly, pushing her fingers against my lips as I start to protest. "I don't know what you see in me."

She pauses and clears her throat nervously. "I only said it in the simulation, didn't I?" she asks. I know what's she's asking me and try to nod, but the vertebrae in my neck feel locked in a rigid line.

"Remember the ferris wheel?"

My neck unbends a little for a nod.

"The height didn't bother me at all, so at first I couldn't understand why my guts were quaking and I couldn't catch my breath." she traces my lips with her fingers. "and then I realized it was you. I knew how I felt about you in my body before I knew it in my mind."

"It's you, Tobias, and it has always been you. I love you." she leans so close to me that her nose is touching the notch at the base of my neck. "I love you and I am not afraid of what I want. I want you, all of you, just as you are."

I feel as though electricity is surging through the cartilage in my chest as I crush her into my arms and press my hand against her lower back. I kiss her so hard I'm afraid I will hurt her, but she kisses me back with all the hunger and urgency of that last night in Dauntless, before she sacrificed herself to Jeanine. That was the first time - and the only time - we had gotten past her fear of intimacy. And while I know it was what she wanted at the time, I also know it wasn't especially good for her. It hurt too much and was over too fast - it was a first for me, too, after all. But I can tell from the way she's moving against me now that the next time will be better.

"Yeah, okay, people, that's enough!" Christina shouts. Tris and I pull apart in surprise. I glance over at her and see her arms are crossed in annoyance. Uriah is looking at the floor stonily.

Leo has Cara pressed against the wall, his hands pinning hers over her head, and their embrace is so passionate, I feel myself twitch against Tris's waist. "Sorry," I mutter, moving my hips away from her. She smirks and raises her eyebrows at me.

Leo has leaned back. "Cara," he says, looking down. "I think... I want..."

"I sure hope you're not trying to tell me you're married ," she laughs softly. He smiles gratefully at her and kisses her on the nose. "No, no. Not anymore. I'm all yours, if you want a broken down old Dauntless." His forehead wrinkles with concern. "Wait, you're not trying to say you are ?"

"I made a clean break when I left Erudite," she says firmly. "I do not regret my decision.".

"Super!". Christina yells. "You're all going to get laid - great for you. Oh wait, that's right. We're in the middle of a _war."_ I've never seen Christina so angry before, and then I realize why. There are no embraces waiting for her - or for Uriah. Someday I am sure there will be, but now there is only loss and grief for them. And two of the people at least partly responsible for that, are here in the room, making out in front of them. We did not mean to be cruel, but we certainly are being unkind. I flush and look at the floor. Christina snorts. "Now let's get going before the factions kill each other and Leo loses another brother."

From the cold look on Leo's face, I worry that Christina just went too far, but he whispers something in Cara's ear and goes to help Uriah lift Darius. Then he turns to us and says, "ready, Dauntless?"

"And Divergent," Christina says with an embarrassed grin, hooking a thumb at us.

And then we finally leave the room where Tris died and came back to life. Where we saved ourselves and each other. Where our past was rewritten and our future unraveled.

And where we started to tell a new story.

_**Don't worry! Not the end...**_


	25. Chapter 25

_**Okay, I'm starting down this road - new material. This feels really different - no Veronica Roth material to tie it to. I know where I want to go with it, but might take me a little while to get in the groove.**_

The first thing that happens when Leo leads us all out of the room is a gunshot. Before I can even figure out which direction it came from, Leo has a shot off. A blue-shirted man falls backward to the floor, and a second man turns and runs away. As we walk cautiously down the hall, I see that the dead Erudite has a bullet hole right in the middle of his forehead.

"Good shot," Christina says, her calm tone at odds with the shaken look on her face. Leo presses his lips together, his expression unreadable as he moves swiftly ahead of us, gun held straight out in front of him. He steps over the body without looking down, poking the gun around the corner and peering carefully after.

"It's clear," he says. We follow him into the stairwell; no one speaks as we make our way down.

Tris is moving slowly and deliberately, one hand slipping along the rail. Christina is having some trouble, too, pressing her palm to the wound in her thigh. I match their pace, keeping close behind them. Leo is quickly a flight ahead of us.

"Leo," I say it quietly, but in the eerie silence of the stairwell, it sounds as though I'm shouting at him. "Maybe you should go ahead and we'll meet you in the lobby."

Leo shakes his head and waits for us to catch up. "We don't know what's waiting for us down there," he says. "Besides – we can't let them divide us. We have to stay together." I wonder which "they" he means? His former Erudite allies? Or is he talking about Evelyn? Maybe he's just afraid Tori and Harrison are going to kill him by accident. Or on purpose.

It's Christina who gives voice to these thoughts. Leave it to a Candor.

"Wait a minute, wait a minute," Christina says stopping on the landing. "What are 'we' doing? What do you mean by 'they'?" She has her arms crossed, and it's clear she won't go any further without an answer.

"This is a much bigger plot than you think it is," Tris answers her quietly. We all look at her in surprise. "It wasn't just now, and it wasn't just Jeanine. There have been leaders in every faction working together for a generation to keep anyone from finding out the truth. They've been killing and starving the Divergent for years."

"What are you talking about?" I ask her.

"It's true," Leo says, watching Tris with interest.

"But you've been unconscious for three days and a prisoner - how could you possibly know that?" I feel anger rising in me, and I make a conscious effort to get myself under control.

"It's not...it's not that I don't trust you or believe you..." I stutter hurriedly.

I look at Tris, worried that I'm already failing to live up to my promises, but she's not looking at me at all.

"I don't know how I know that," she says, brow furrowed. "I don't remember."

"Here's what I think," Leo says. "It's time to get to the bottom of this. We need to get a group of Divergent together, and whoever else wants to know what we were meant to do and go outside the fence. But we have to try to get control of what's inside the fence first for that to happen, or at least find some allies. That's what we need to go do now downstairs, ok?"

He looks at Christina, who is thinking it over. No one says anything for a few minutes, which seem to stretch on uncomfortably long.

"I want to know why we're here," Tris says softly. "Even if it turns out we're just some kind of science experiment. I need to know why…all of those people died."

We're all looking at Tris, but she's staring into space, a dazed look on her face. I grip her good shoulder, trying to get her attention. She shakes her head a little and focuses her gaze on me. She smiles wanly.

"So. Let's go do it," she says simply. I nod slowly.

Christina shrugs. "Okay."

Even at a slower pace, we're at the door to the lobby before I think any of us is ready to be.


	26. Chapter 26

When Leo opens the heavy door, gun held up, no wall of sound hits us, as I expected. Instead, we can hear muffled sobs and groans and water dripping somewhere. Leo and Christina's feet crunch over the debris and glass, which means Tris and I have to concentrate on the floor, since we are both still barefoot. The chaos we saw on the surveillance cameras has dissipated, and there are just a few Erudite wandering around or sitting dazed against the walls. Across the room, there's a long table with what looks like a body on it. I stare at the disordered blonde hair and the splayed limbs and realize it is probably Jeanine. Blood is pooled below her on the floor.

Tris is staring at the body, and I can see as she also realizes who it is. A look of revulsion crosses her face, followed quickly by low-boil fury. She clenches her jaw, both fists - even her toes are curling.

Suddenly, a group of armed Factionless step out from behind a column and move toward us. They keep their weapons pointed down, so we do not raise ours, either.

"You got a hearing problem?" one grizzled man sneers at us. He's wearing a dirty red shirt and black pants too short for his lanky frame. "Everyone's supposed to go home and wait for their faction leaders to tell them what to do. And you'll have to give us your guns."

"We _are_ faction leaders," I say coldly. "Where's Evelyn?"

The man laughs jeeringly at me and starts to respond, but the thick-waisted woman next to him pokes him in the back with her rifle butt. "What, dammit? " he shouts at her. She stands on her tiptoes and whispers to him.

His face actually goes pale as he shoots a glance at me, muttering about having something else to do. He slumps away.

The woman looks at me with dusky, shrewd eyes. Nodding, she says curtly: "You come with me. The rest have to stay here."

I cross my arms and look down my nose at her. "No." I say, without explanation.

We stare at each other, neither of us blinking. "Fine," she snaps. She turns sideways with a dramatic flourish of her arms. "Right this way, your highness." I look at her out of the corner of my eye as I walk past. She actually has a small, lopsided smile on her face.

The man next to her, however, has his finger on the trigger of his weapon. When he inches the muzzle up, it's a slight movement, but Christina sees it, too, and steps behind him quickly. Her gun is pressed into the back of the man's head. I have a weapon in each hand, pointing at the woman who spoke and two other Factionless next to her. Leo is facing outward, gun trained on the ragged man who scuttled away when he heard I was Evelyn's son. Tris actually has a gun in her hand, too, but she's not aiming it at anyone and the barrel is visibly quivering. Considering that she couldn't even hold a gun in her simulation, I guess that's progress.

"What's your name?" I say to the woman, who is no longer smiling.

"Inez," she says shortly.

"Inez," I repeat. "We don't want any trouble with your people, here."

"A little late for that, don't you think?" she shoots back.

"Your man there was raising his weapon," I note coolly. "We're going to disarm him, but we have no intention of hurting him."

Without moving the gun off his skull, Christina reaches around him and yanks his weapon out of his hands. She tucks it into the back of her pants and then pats him down, extracting a knife from his sock.

He leers at Christina. "I got one more rod, sweetheart. Don't you want to grab it?"

"Shut up, Ray," Inez barks as Christina whacks him on the back of the head. "Ow!" he yells, rubbing the back of his head and shooting Christina a murderous look. She smiles broadly at him and puckers her lips in a kissing motion.

"Okay, Inez," I break in. "Ready to go?"

She turns sharply on her heel and marches across the room. I look at the other Factionless pointedly, and they follow Inez. Leo walks backward with us, watching the other side of the room.

Inez leads us up a flight of stairs to a gray, metal door. Two Factionless flank it. "Yeah?" one says, narrowing his eyes as he looks over Inez's shoulder at us.

"It's him," she says simply, jerking her thumb back at me. His eyes widen, and he raps on the door.

"What's going on, Four?" Leo hisses at me.

"It's a long story," Tris says. "Let's just say he has connections."

I roll my eyes at her.

The door opens a crack, and the guard mutters something. The door opens wider and we follow Inez in.


	27. Chapter 27

"Thank God, you're safe," Evelyn exclaims, striding across the room to fold me into her arms. My own arms stay stiffly at my sides, but she shows no sign that she notices. She sees Tris around my shoulder and her eyebrows shoot up.

"We heard you were dead."

Tris returns her look levelly and says "Apparently not."

Evelyn inclines her head, in what could be interpreted either as an accepting or indifferent gesture, and then turns around, putting her arm around my shoulders and pulling me toward a long table across the room. It looks just like the table Jeanine's body was displayed on, and for a moment, I imagine I see her empty staring eyes. I shrug Evelyn's arm off but continue to walk with her.

I can hear Tris murmuring to Leo and Christina, so I'm sure they're getting the backstory. They know that Tris suspects I cut a deal with Evelyn from watching the simulation, but the personal tie was not obvious.

Tori is sitting at the table, which has a large map spread across it. "Four!" Tori calls out, jumping up and putting her hands on my shoulder. "It's good to see you – I somehow knew you'd make it." She stops and gasps when she sees Tris.

"Oh my God," she shouts, running to Tris and throwing her arms around her. I look away. The sight of Tori in tears seems somehow obscene.

"When Four told me where you'd gone... What you'd done... I was so mad at you at first," I look back and see her give Tris a little shake. "I never thought I'd see you again!"

Tori frowns. Tris is rigid in her arms and won't look at her.

"What's wrong?" Tori asks.

"Oh!" Christina says suddenly. She taps Tris's forearm. "Look, Tris. No bite mark. It didn't happen in real life."

Tris looks at her arm and then up at Tori, startled. " You... you're not mad at me?"

"Of course not! I never really was. What you did was incredibly brave - I just wish you had talked it over with us first. But you," she says, narrowing her eyes and turning on Christina. "What the hell do you think you were doing? You took sides with _Erudite_ - and that traitor?" she all but shouts, flicking a hand towards Leo.

"No, you don't understand," Christina protests, backing away. "Cara knew him – he found us in the lobby and took us to Tris. I swear, we were just trying to save her! But you wouldn't listen to us."

Tori continues to stare her down.

"Tori," I say firmly. "Christina is telling the truth. We needed information Jeanine had - we were lucky Tris's brother was able to help us instead, or we would have lost her." I have to clear my throat. "And this is Leo..."

"Yeah, I know who he is." she says, voice hard as iron.

"We go way back," Leo says quietly.

"Well," Evelyn breaks in cheerfully, "I hate to break up this happy reunion, but the other faction leaders should be here soon, and we have much to talk about." She gestures to me and Tori.

"Leo, too," I say.

"Absolutely not," Tori snaps.

"He's the leader of the other half of our Faction," I say stubbornly. "Like it or not, they chose him."

"It's alright, Four."

"No," I say looking at Leo, "it's not. You said it was time to bring the faction back together. Time to remember who we are. Did you think that would be easy?"

Tori snorts. "Right. He only said that to save himself when he realized he was on the losing side."

"Tori," Tris says, "Four and I would both be dead and Jeanine would still be in charge without Leo."

Tori looks at her in surprise. "It's true," I add. "I know he has a lot of lives to answer for and we'll have to find a way to work through that. But he also saved many lives by preventing Jeanine from activating another attack simulation."

Tori glares at all of us and then whirls around and returns to the table. Leo walks next to me, gripping my shoulder.

"Ex-girlfriend, maybe?" I whisper. He smiles wryly at me and moves to the far side of the table when I sit next to Tori.

"I heard that!" Tori growls at me when I sit next to her. "That has nothing to do with it. He's a mass murderer and a traitor. Don't let yourself forget that."

"I won't," I promise. "But he saved Tris, and I can't forget that, either. And we need unity - please try to keep an open mind, for the sake of the faction."

I can still practically see steam pouring out of her ears, but she does nod grimly, so at least there's hope. I glance back over my shoulder and see that Inez's patrol is nowhere to be seen, but Inez herself has taken Christina and Tris over to the far side of the room where there's food and drinks. They appear to be talking peaceably, so I turn my attention to the table in front of me.

There's a huge map spread across the table showing the city in great detail, the walls around its perimeter, and the farms beyond. There are also access points of some kind at the outer edge of the map.

"Where did you get this?" I ask Evelyn.

"Abnegation," she responds. "They had some interesting records."

She looks at me, arching an eyebrow. "We thought Erudite might have even more, but we don't seem to be able to find anything at all on their system." I ignore the question in her eyes. Cara's program must have run its course, and though Evelyn is my mother and supposedly my ally, I'm very relieved.


	28. Chapter 28

The Abnegation have clearly been exploring the city for some time. There are markings all over the map. Some Buildings are outlined in blue - many I recognize as Factionless safe houses. The Abnegation must have charted which structures were inhabitable.

"What are these?" I ask, pointing to the access points beyond the farms.

"We don't know." Evelyn responds. "We weren't able to get out that far - not without attracting attention," she adds.

"Do you plan to go out there?" I say, trying to keep my voice as neutral as possible.

"It's not my top priority," Evelyn says, equally neutral, watching me closely.

"Well, what is your top priority?" Tori interrupts. "We obviously noticed that you've confiscated the traitor Dauntless and Erudite weapons. What are your intentions?"

"In due time," Evelyn replies smoothly. "Let's wait for the other Faction leaders before we all share our expectations."

I feel a cool hand on my neck and look up at Tris. She kisses me on the cheek, handing me some water and an apple.

"There's more food," she says softly. "When's the last time you ate? Or slept?" she asks, trailing her fingers along my cheek. I close my eyes for a moment, savoring the shiver I get from her touch. Then my stomach growls loudly.

"There's your answer," I laugh. Suddenly, I know that Evelyn is watching us. From the look Tris gives me, she knows it, too. I stand up and put my hands on either side of Tris's face, my fingers curling around her ears, and I pull her in for a long kiss.

"You are my family now," I whisper to her. Tris smiles at me. "Did you say that to me before?" she asks, "Or was that not real life?"

I smile back at her. "I have thought it so many times that it certainly feels real to me." I sigh. "But no, that was in the simulation."

She looks at me with no sign of the reservations she felt when I said it to her then. "Come and look at the map," I say, lacing our fingers together and taking a bite of the apple.

The door opens to admit Johanna Reyes and several Amity carrying crates.

Evelyn nods to her and motions her over to the table. Johanna inclines her head gracefully, but goes first to supervise the unpacking of the cartons. She soon comes to the table with her hands full and approaches me and Tris.

"I thought the two of you might be...depleted after your ordeal," Johanna says. "We brought you some specially prepared food." Johanna hands us what look like flattened loaves of bread, knobby with dried fruit, nuts, and oats. Tris eyes the loaf suspiciously, and Johanna smiles. "These are nutritionally dense, but that's all. Nothing else has been added," she notes.

"Hey, this stuff is great!" Christina exclaims, walking over to us with a loaf of bread in each hand. "Inez and I are going to find Uriah and see how Darius is doing, okay?" she says with her mouth full.

Christina gives Tris a big hug and starts toward me. I can't help but shrink from her a bit, but she just laughs and punches me in the shoulder. Inez follows her out the door.

"I'm not so sure it's a good idea for her to turn her back on Inez," I remark, covering my embarrassment.

"Inez is okay," Tris says. "She used to be Candor - Christina knows her brother. She's Divergent." I know we've been told many of the Factionless are Divergent, but I wonder just how many, and what kind of shape they are in. Are they going to be angry and disaffected, like Edward or the man Christina just disarmed? Or are they going to be okay, like Inez?

I take a bite of the Amity loaf - it has a crunchy exterior but is soft on the inside and tastes faintly of honey. "Thank you," I nod to Johanna. "How did you know what happened to us?"

Johanna smiles gently again. "When your faction supplies food to everyone else, you tend to know things. Speaking of which," she leans forward, lowering her voice. "You should know who leads Abnegation now..."

Before she can finish her sentence, however, the gray, metal door opens again, and Marcus strolls in, followed by a very nervous looking Jack Kang.

Johanna meets my eyes apologetically. Across the table, Evelyn is sitting very still, as Marcus approaches her.

"What do you think you are doing here?" She asks, deadly calm.

He looks at her down his nose, equally calm. "As the sole surviving Abnegation leader, I represent my faction."

"Unacceptable," Evelyn snaps. "They will have to find someone else."

"There is no one else," he growls.

Everyone in the room is watching this exchange in bewilderment - with the exception of me and Tris. I feel nauseated. When I sneak a look at Tris, though, she's smiling and her eyes are dancing. I look at her coldly and let go of her hand.

"What part of this is amusing for you?" I say quietly.

Her face falls. "Sorry," she mutters. "It's just - would you ever have predicted your family would control the city? Eatons are running half the factions now. " I groan and close my eyes.

"I believe Amity will also need to consider another representative," Johanna cuts in smoothly. "And I suspect other factions may have changes. But for the purposes of what to do right now, perhaps we should move forward with who we have."

"Who will represent Erudite?" Jack Kang says, looking around the room.

"We will," says Cara, walking into the room with an older man I don't recognize.

"Do you have any standing to speak for your faction?" Kang demands.

"No, I don't," Cara responds politely. No one says anything.

The man with her clears his throat. "I am Linus Epstein," he says. "I have run the Erudite medical clinics for two decades. Politics never interested me much, but I believe most of my faction would accept me as a leader. And Cara here was without question the leader of the defectors." He looks at her with obvious affection. "Or loyalists, depending on your point of view."

Tris is staring at Linus. I take her hand again and squeeze it, but she keeps staring at him as he sits at the table.


	29. Chapter 29

"Let's get started then," Evelyn says, literally turning her back on Marcus. "Thank you all for coming. It is time to discuss how we will reconcile and rebuild."

"And who put you in charge?" Jack Kang demands.

"I _am_ in charge. Without my people, Erudite would have enslaved yours and all of your factions would have submitted to Jeanine's rule or suffered the fate of Abnegation. And you did nothing to stop any of it." Evelyn pauses for a moment, but Kang is uncharacteristically silent. "Plus, we outnumber all of you put together, and we have confiscated the weapons of the Erudite Alliance. So yes, I am in charge." She pauses again to let it all sink in.

"Shall we talk terms?" She inquires politely.

"Terms?" Tori asks, outraged. "What do you mean terms? We're allies!"

"You were complicit in this oppressive faction system long before you were an ally," Evelyn says smoothly. "But you get extra credit for doing the right thing at the last minute."

"Abnegation always did the right thing," Marcus chastises her. Evelyn's eyes spark.

"Not always," Tris says before Evelyn can yell at Marcus again. Everyone turns and stares at her. "It was Abnegation leaders who started it all," she continues as though in a trance, eyes unfocused. "25 years ago, they told the other faction leaders that Divergence was a threat to society. Before that, it was rare for anyone to be Factionless. Almost everyone was placed in the faction they tested into or chose."

The room is utterly still for a few, very long seconds. Tris is frowning, still with a distant look on her face. Suddenly, she realizes everyone is staring at her and she flushes violently, her mouth dropping open. She looks at me in confusion and astonishment - which is probably the look on my face, too.

The room erupts into accusations, denials, and disbelief.

"No!" Marcus roars, slapping his palms down on the table. "There's no way you could know that, Beatrice!"

She shrinks against me.

"Are you actually taking this girl seriously?" Evelyn says in disbelief. "She obviously just wants attention! Anything to get my son to notice her!" She gestures dramatically at me.

"Son?" Tori says, looking at me in shock. "She's your _mother_?"

Marcus says nothing. He just glowers at Tris, his lips pressed in a thin line.

"She is telling the truth," says a quavering voice. It's the older Erudite, Linus. He's looking intently at Tris, but with curiosity rather than hostility.

She nods at him. "I recognized you," she says. "You figured out the faction test."

"Indeed. I was a brain researcher like Cara here when I was young and I diagnosed what I later knew to be Divergence." He crosses his arms and seems to be talking only to Tris. "It is a fascinating neurological phenomenon. Those with the facility have a suite of characteristics, the most common of which is the ability to see patterns and connections - they tend to be inveterate problem solvers." He chuckles. "And less usefully, they are often quite restless." I stop tapping my fingers against the table.

"It's highly genetic. The child of one Divergent has a 30 percent or more chance of being Divergent. A child of two Divergents - greater than 50 percent. It's extremely rare for a trait to propagate that quickly, so I was able to determine that it was becoming increasingly common across all factions." The thought chills me - if Tris and I were ever to have children... I shake off the thought. We wouldn't want to have children in the world we live in right now. And given my personal experience with parenting, probably not a good idea, anyway.

"When I went to my Faction chief with my discovery," Linus continues, as everyone watches him, "he forced me to destroy my research. He told me the Abnegation leaders had shared information about the dangers of the so-called Divergent." He pauses, looking down. "He made me his top advisor, and I helped him develop a test that could detect Divergence. Jeanine Matthews was my research assistant." He sighs. "Once I realized how they were using the test, I retired to run the clinics. But I helped Divergent Erudite whenever I could." He looks up again at Tris. "But how, my dear," he says to her kindly, "is it possible that you know?"

Tris presses into me, shaking her head frantically. "I...I don't know," she stutters. "I read it somewhere, i think," she says uncertainly.

Cara has been watching her intently, too, and when Tris says the part about reading it, Cara's eyes suddenly widen. She walks over to Leo and whispers in his ear. He just looks at her for a moment and then they head for the door. Leo meets my eyes and mouths, "Be right back."

"Well," Evelyn says briskly, "just one more reason to set things right."


	30. Chapter 30

Evelyn then lays out what she calls the Freedom Manifesto, Freedom being the new name she has given her faction. According to her document, every citizen of the city has the right to claim allegiance to a faction of their choice, or to choose Freedom. Freedom's role in society is to promote and protect equality - to food, security, health, education, and legal protection. Freedom representatives will be present in all factions, and all factions will send delegates to Freedom. If Freedom leaders are unsatisfied with any faction, they can imprison a faction's leaders or confiscate goods.

I hear Kang snort and comment that it doesn't sound much like freedom to him.

A heated negotiation ensues.

Leo and Cara return about an hour later carrying a large, insulated bag. Tris and I step away from the table to talk to them.

"What is it?" Tris whispers. Cara unzips the bag and we see that it's full of the purple serum. Tris gasps. "We forgot to destroy it," I groan.

Cara shakes her head emphatically. "Trust me," she says, "we don't want to destroy it. But it's really important that it not fall into the wrong hands." She passes the bag to me, and I take it uneasily. Leo smiles at me and gives Cara a kiss before returning to the table.

"What did I miss?" she whispers. We fill her in, and then she looks at us expectantly.

"What?" Tris asks.

"They're forgetting the most important thing," Cara whispers. We both look at her, waiting. "Oh come on," she says, rolling her eyes. "You both obviously have an aptitude for Erudite - act like it!" Admittedly, I just stare at her blankly.

"They're awfully focused on the mission inside the fence, don't you think?" Cara winks at us and strolls over to sit next to Leo at the table.

Tris and I look at each other in surprise. I raise my eyebrows at her. After a brief hesitation, she nods slowly. I nod, too, and then we both go back to the table.

After another hour, they've more or less reached a compromise. Evelyn is getting most of her manifesto, though it's the council of faction leaders that together decides penalties if any one faction is not playing its part. All factions will have representatives in each other's leadership. Cara has already volunteered to be Erudite's representative to Dauntless. Looking at Tori's face, I am not sure that's wise.

And there will be a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to sort through what has happened, make amends, and grant either amnesty or punishment. Erudite can only participate as an observer, and only individuals who are not implicated in the massacres.

Then Tori throws a wrench in the works. "I can't commit to any of this, of course," she says casually. "We have four Dauntless leaders right now, so it means none of us is legitimate until we hold an election and get the number down to three."

"Actually," I say quickly, before anyone can react, "I can fix that. I resign. I am no longer a Dauntless leader." Evelyn is shaking her head violently at me. Tori looks dumbfounded.

"Why would you do that?" Kang demands.

"Tris and I are going to lead the Divergent. Specifically, we are going to recruit and train Divergent volunteers for a mission to go outside the fence with us."

"It's time to find out why we were all put here and what's out there," Tris says firmly.

Marcus is quick to agree. "In fact," he says, "I will join your mission."

Johanna responds immediately, before either Tris or I can let Marcus know exactly what we think of that proposal. "Marcus, that is, of course, a selfless offer, but I think your most important mission lies inside the fence. Your faction has lost so much, suffered so terribly, and rebuilding will be a heavy burden. They cannot afford to lose you now - none of us can."

Marcus turns an icy, almost threatening look on Johanna, but her placid smile and gentle hand on his arm make it difficult for him to openly disagree. "I concur," says Cara.

"I think it will be important for you to lead the Truth and Reconciliation effort," Leo says gravely.

"That has to be a Candor responsibility!" Jack Kang exclaims, and another heated negotiation ensues.

"I think it's time for us to go," Tris whispers. "Let's find Christina and Uriah - and we might as well bring Inez with us." I smile at her, taking her hand and hitching the bag of purple serum up my shoulder.


	31. Chapter 31

_**Short chapter - kind of a bridge chapter to move the story to a different place. But please R&R! **_

It's mostly quiet in Erudite. People seem to have taken the order to stay in their homes seriously. We do see a few armed blue shirters, but they either surrender their weapons to us voluntarily or flee at the sight of our black clothes. We're going to have more guns than we can carry, at this rate.

Then we run into two Dauntless in the stairwell, apparently weaponless, with ragged holes in their jackets where the traitor armbands used to be. "Do  
you guys know where everyone went?" the man says. The woman he's with elbows him in the ribs excitedly.

"I recognize you! You're Tris!" she exclaims, mouth open in shock. "We heard you were alive!" She pulls Tris into a hug. I'm wondering if maybe one of these people fired the bullet that wounded Tris or the one that killed her mother. Or maybe that guy's boot is the one that left a bruise so deep on my cheekbone that it may never fully heal. But these two seem totally oblivious to how we might be feeling about them.

Tris handles it better than I do. "Yeah, thanks," she says briskly. "Do you know where the main hospital is? One of our Dauntless friends was taken there."

"Sure," the man says enthusiastically. "It's on the 9th floor - we can take you to it."

"Oh, hey," Tris says hastily, "that's okay - you should actually get back to Dauntless. They want everyone to go back - we're just checking on our friend before we go."

They tell us how to get to the hospital and move off down the stairs. About a flight down, the woman calls out awkwardly from the shadows, "Uh, Tris?"

"Yeah?" Tris says, grinding her teeth impatiently.

"We're... really...uh...we're really sorry. About...everything."

"Yeah, okay," Tris says softly, nodding at them and waving. We don't talk as we climb the stairs. "Thank you," Tris says, pausing as we reach the 9th floor.

"For what?"

"For not saying what you were thinking out loud."

I just look at her for a moment. "I suspect," I say slowly, "that's going to happen to you a lot."

She sighs and says, "The sooner we get outside the wall, the better."

"No arguments there."

We look at each other, realize what we just said, and both start laughing hysterically.

"There must be something seriously wrong with us," I say, still chuckling.

Tris wipes her eyes and grins up at me. "Every now and then, it's nice to just be a teenager."

We get to be teenagers a little longer once we find the hospital. Darius is awake, and he's playing Dauntless Slap with Christina and  
Uriah. It's a card game that generally goes from being a little kids game to a drinking game to something no adult would play. The first player to  
call slap on a red card gets to hit another player. If you make a bad call, everyone else slaps you. Both Uriah and Christina have red cheeks,  
but Darius is pale against the pillows, and while I know that's partly from the blood loss, I suspect he's also just better at Slap. He looks up when we  
walk in, and Christina happily screams, "Slap!" and smacks Darius across the face. That might seem a terrible thing to do to someone who  
almost died today, but Darius just cracks up. "You are so going down!" he says to Christina.

Inez is sitting nearby in a chair, watching, with an amused expression. Her smile fades when she sees me looking at her.

"I'll go now," she says curtly, rising to her feet.

"No, stay," Tris says, putting a hand on her arm. "We want to talk to you about something."


	32. Chapter 32

After some discussion, Inez agrees to return to Dauntless with us to set up the Divergent mission. I'm still not sure I trust her, but I am trying to show that I trust Tris, and she thinks Inez is important to our success. For that matter, Tris definitely doesn't trust Evelyn, so it says something if she still wants Inez to come with us. Uriah, of course, is in, but then both Christina and Darius say they are in, too. Tris stares at the floor uncomfortably.

I clear my throat and put my hand lightly on Christina's shoulder, the kind of casual contact I imagine most people find reassuring. I use my instructor voice.

"Christina, I've seen more courage and strength from you these past few days than I've seen in Dauntless who've been Members for decades. The way you disarmed that guy - who was he, Inez?"

"Ray," she says, rolling her eyes. "He's a - what was the word, Uriah? Patty cake?"

"Close enough," Uriah crows. I glower at him.

"Yeah - Ray. The point is, I can't think of someone I'd rather have on my team..."

She scowls at me and pushes my hand off, though I can tell she likes what I said. "Don't suck up to me, Four. You look like a dog that just ate a pair of high heels - empty praise doesn't work for you. You don't want me along. I get it. Just say so."

Making an example of Christina on her first day in Dauntless, of what it meant to leave your faction behind - that was easy. Someone makes it easy every year. But there's nothing easy about this. I have to remember not to underestimate Christina.

So I drop my hand and look her in the eyes. "I do want you along," I say simply. "But given what Amanda Ritter said, I am not sure it is safe for anyone who isn't Divergent."

She returns my look, deadly serious, confirming that she's no longer just an initiate. "I am not sure it's safe for anyone."

"Probably not," I agree softly, "but we have to try."

There's nothing else to say for the moment and so we're all quiet until Leo and Cara join us. It's the first time Leo and Darius have seen each other since Sam died, so I stand up to leave and give them some space.

"No, stay," Leo says, flicking his eyes at me. "We're all family now." I look at Tris, startled by his choice of words, and she smiles at me, eyes shining. "Hopefully, he means something a little different," she murmurs.

Leo gives Darius a fierce hug. "Glad to see you alive, baby brother," he says, voice thick with emotion. Darius nods, gripping Leo's arm.

We all talk for awhile about comfortable things. Mostly about Dauntless - the good parts, like paintball, cake, zip lining, just being free. But also the parts that need to change - initiation, training, the fact that our sense of community had frayed long before Max and Eric shredded it completely.

"Well, I think it's a good time for us to go home - literally," Leo announces, standing up and stretching. Darius struggles to rise, too, but Leo reaches out and puts a hand on his chest, holding him back. "I can't do this without you, Dari," he says quietly, "and I don't like leaving you here alone one bit, but I need you to heal."

Darius slams a fist against the pillows in frustration. "I just want out of this hellhole," he mutters. "I'm sick of being here."

"No offense," he adds, glancing at Cara.

"I'm looking forward to getting out of here myself," she responds gravely.

"I'll stay here with him," Christina offers, straining to keep her voice casual. I see a look pass between her and Tris, which I pretend not to notice.

"That would be great," Leo says, putting an arm along Christina's shoulders. "The doctor thinks he might be able to leave in a couple of days."

Christina nods. "I'll take care of him for you, Leo." It's an oblique apology for what she said about losing his brothers. Leo kisses her on the forehead.

"I'm right here, you know," Darius grumbles, clutching at the sheets.

"Oh, get over yourself," Christina says briskly. "Don't make me sorry I said I'd babysit you."

Darius glares at her, but he moves over in the bed and makes space for her to sit down. I glance back as we leave the room and see that he was maybe putting on a show of strength for our benefit. His eyes are closed, sunken with exhaustion, and he's slumped back against the pillows. Christina is holding his hand, murmuring softly to him.


	33. Chapter 33

As we walk down the stairwell, Cara tells us she needs to go to the basement. "Quick errand," she says. It's dark and quiet on that level, with a few emergency lights dimly illuminated along the bottom of the wall. Cara disappears behind a metal door, asking us to wait in the hallway for her. She's in there for a long time, and just when Leo starts to pace, she comes out holding two pairs of shoes.

"What took you so long?" Leo asks her.

"Not easy to find a pair his size," she notes, nodding in my direction. "Size 13, right?" she says to me.

"Good guess," I respond, raising my eyebrows at her. I look at the shoes, which are black, with chrome eyelets. "Where did you get these?"

She ignores my question. "These are what the prestigious Erudite wear - the leaders and teachers."

She turns to Tris. "Will a size six fit you?" she asks anxiously. "That's the smallest I could find."

"Close enough," Tris says, taking the blue canvas sneakers. "Thank you."

I look at the door Cara came through - the metal is heavy, and I can feel cold air emanating from behind it. Suddenly, I realize what's in that room, and where these shoes came from. I look at Cara in shock.

She won't meet my eyes and turns to go. No one says anything as we leave Erudite.

As we pick our way through the rubble and broken glass, Cara seeks me out. "I knew him," she says, still not looking at me. "It would bother him more that they might go to waste." I try and fail not to think about the fact that I'm walking in a dead man's shoes.

After a few minutes, I say to Cara, pitching my voice so no one else can hear me, "I was wearing shoes just like this in Tris's simulation."

Cara shoots me a look. "I see."

"Any idea how that's possible? Or how she knew when the Abnegation were first targeted?"

"What are you two talking about?" Tris asks from behind me. She was with Leo and Uriah, but she moves so quietly I didn't hear her, even over all the trash and debris and eerie, city-wide silence.

"You, of course," Cara answers quickly.

"What about me?"

"How you seem to know some things you shouldn't really know."

Tris is quiet.

"Any ideas?" I prod gently.

Tris shakes her head.

"Cara?" I ask. "I can tell you have a hypothesis." She smiles as I use her own words against her.

"I do," she confirms. "But I have to warn you that it's a SWAG."

"Is that some technical term?" I ask.

Cara laughs. "You might say that! It basically means I have not yet collected a preponderance of evidence."

We wait for her to continue as we move through the broken streets, because there's no point in trying to rush Cara. She finally sighs. "I think it has something to do with the purple serum," she says. "It may have a two-way transmitter."

"Two way?" I prompt her.

"Usually, Jeanine would put a transmitter in a serum so a computer could communicate with the person injected. But I think she made it possible for the person injected to communicate with the computer, too, and that's how she was recording the simulation."

She says nothing for several minutes. I clear my throat, "So?"

"So," she says slowly, "I think Tris used the two-way transmitter as a pathway into the Erudite mainframe while she was in the simulation."

Cara pauses again, letting us digest her theory. "I think maybe all those times it looked like she was sleeping, she was exploring."

"What do you think, Tris?" she says softly.

Tris is watching the ground, stepping carefully around broken pavement. "I don't remember," she responds, biting the inside of her cheek. "But if that's true, do you think it's something I can do again?"

"Absolutely not!" I say sharply, a little too loud.

"Shhh, Four!" Leo hisses. "We don't know who is out here!"

"Absolutely not," I repeat quietly. "We almost lost you – you were trapped inside your own mind. What if we can't get you out next time? No, no – there won't be a next time!" I'm so angry with her for even suggesting it, I can't look at her.

No one says anything for some time - we can see the Pire just ahead now.

Finally, I glance at Tris, from under my lashes. She's watching me, levelly, not saying anything. Cara is watching me, too. In fact they are all watching me, and I can feel their judgment hanging heavily in the air around us.

I take a deep breath. "Okay," I say. "Fine. You can all just shut up now."

"No one is saying a word, genius," Uriah comments.

"Yeah, you didn't have to," I say darkly.

It's going to be very annoying that I exposed my deepest secrets and fears to a roomful of people. But then again, maybe it's not all that bad – maybe the only way for me to get past my fears is to have help.

I'm startled when Tris slips her hand into mine. She's smiling at me. "It's not funny," I grump.

"No, but you're cute when you're angry. A little angry, anyway." She squeezes my hand and runs her finger along my palm. "Don't worry, Tobias. I am not going to do anything stupid, and I'm not going to do anything without talking it over with you." I squeeze her hand back and nod. That will have to be enough – I will have to learn not to ask for more than that.

Speaking of which... I clear my throat nervously as we work our way into one of the hidden entrance tunnels to Dauntless.

"Uh, Tris, do you want to just stay with me? Um, tonight, I mean?" I want her to move in with me, but I don't want to ask for too much, too soon.

"Yes," she says simply. "Of course." She leans against me, putting her arm around my waist as we stumble tiredly down the darks halls. I'm not sure if she means just tonight or always, but for now, I can let this be enough.


	34. Chapter 34

"Inez," I say yawning, "would you mind staying in the dorms tonight? We'll find you an apartment tomorrow."

Her eyes widen, and I realize she's probably never had her own place. "Dorms are fine," she says, looking around the Pit with an awestruck stare.

"Is there anything you need right now?" Tris asks Cara and Inez. "Any clothes?"

"It can wait til tomorrow," Cara assures us. "But then I'd like the full tour." Leo has his arm around her, hipbone to hipbone.

"Let's get some food," Uriah says, stalking toward the kitchens. We all follow him down, where we find plenty of leftovers from dinner. There is no discussion, no talking at all. Everyone focuses on the food.

Leo leans back finally. "I don't think any of us has had a real meal in a while," he sighs. Uriah belches loudly. Everyone groans and Tris throws a roll at him. "Sorry," he says, not sounding all that sorry.

"I haven't had a meal like that since I left Candor ten years ago," Inez says quietly.

There's an uneasy silence. "Well, that has to change now," I say, turning to Leo and Cara. "You'll make sure it changes while we're gone,  
right?"

"I swear it," Leo says solemnly. Cara nods. Inez looks uncomfortable, but that lopsided smile pulls at the corner of her lips.

Uriah goes off to look for Zeke, and the rest of us take Inez to the dorm. It's unsettlingly empty.

"This was my bunk," Tris says, running her hand across the sheets, which are thrown back exactly the way she left them the night Marlene died.

Leo clears his throat. "Inez, Darius and Sam have a place just down the hall from me - it's empty for now. Why don't you just stay there tonight?"

"Okay," she says. Tris makes a bag of one of the sheets and piles what looks to be all of her belongings into it. My heart beats a little faster - maybe she's moving in with me after all.

"And where will I stay?" Cara inquires. Leo starts. "Oh, I uh, thought you'd stay, uh, with me..." he stutters, looking at her in dismay. "I'm so sorry!" he says. "I didn't mean to... There are two bedrooms in Sam's place... Where Sam used to live..."

Cara actually giggles.

"Oh," he exhales, as he realizes she was teasing him. "You're going to pay for that, sweetheart!" he says, laughing as she runs out the door and up the path. We follow as he chases after her, grabbing her and wrapping his arms around her from behind.

"I'm not scared of you, Dauntless," she says loftily.

"Just you wait, Erudite," I hear him whisper to her as we catch up. "I'll have you screaming soon enough."

"Are they always like this?" Inez mutters.

"Don't know," I say shrugging at her. "They've only known each other a couple of days." She raises her eyebrows at me.

Cara clears her throat, unwinding herself from Leo's embrace, but keeping a tight grip on his hand. "Actually, that's not true. We got to know each other when the Dauntless first started helping Jeanine" she says.

"Here we are," Leo announces as we reach the apartment, feeling along the top of the doorframe for the key. "Make yourself at home, Inez," he says, opening the door. "We're four doors down, on the left."

"Thanks ," she says taking the key from him.

"Sam's bedroom was the one at the end of the hall," he says quietly.

Cara pulls him away down the corridor. "Goodnight!" she calls out to us, without looking back.

"Will you be okay?" Tris asks Inez.

"Don't worry about me," she reassures us. "I can take care of myself - been doing it a long time. Anyway, I'm looking forward to sleeping in a real bed."

"See you in the morning," I say, putting my arm around Tris's shoulders and turning her towards my room.

As tired as we are, I think our need to be clean actually outweighs our need for sleep. I let her shower first. She's already asleep as I crawl under the covers next to her.

"Tobias," she says cracking one eye open, "this was a really, really long day."

"Sleep," I say chuckling. "I love you." She mumbles that she loves me, too, and I kiss her gently on the lips. That's the last thing I remember before falling into the first dreamless sleep I've had in a long time.


	35. Chapter 35

The sound of someone pounding on the door wakes me up. Not the frantic knock of a threat, but the persistent knock of someone who isn't going away until I come to the door.

"Four!" Harrison shouts. "I know you're in there - get up!" I groan and stumble to the door.

"What?" I snap, yanking it open. "What is so important that you couldn't let me sleep for a few hours?"

Harrison chuckles. "It's 3:00 in the afternoon. You've been sleeping a lot of hours." I groan again. "We've got a leadership council meeting - you need to be there in 30 minutes."

"I'm not a leader anymore," I yawn.

Harrison looks at me. "Yeah, I wish you'd talked to me before you did that. Tori's pretty steamed," he sighs. "But they want you and Tris there as Divergent leaders."

"We'll be there," Tris calls from across the room. I roll my eyes as Harrison gives me a huge smile and winks at me. "See you both soon."

I get back into bed and Tris moves into my arms. "I had hoped we'd have a little time alone together this morning," I say, trying to keep my tone light. Tris surprises me, rolling on top of me, looking down into my face, her eyes bright.

"Tonight?" she whispers, leaning down to kiss me slowly.

"Tonight," I agree, my hands sliding down the small of her back and under the hem of her shirt.

She rolls off of me and goes to get some clothes out of her bundle.

"I have an extra drawer here," I say casually, getting up and pulling clothes out for myself, "if you want to put your things away." I can feel her eyes on my back, and I wonder what she's thinking.

I hear her behind me and I turn around, tensing. She's holding her sheet full of belongings.

"Which one?" she asks calmly.

"What?" I say blankly.

"Which drawer is empty?"

I open it for her.

"Thanks," she says, dumping her clothes in the drawer. Then she goes into the bathroom to change, and I hurriedly pull on a clean t-shirt and jeans.

She comes out wearing a black dress. I purse my lips, eyeing the way the dress clings to her, leaving her legs bare and tattoos exposed.

"I've never seen you wear that before," I say appreciatively

"Christina made me buy it," she says, blushing and tugging at the fabric.

"I've decided not to underestimate Christina," I say, catching her in my arms and kissing the raven tattoos across her collarbone.

"We should go," I murmur against her neck, not moving. She nods, eyes closed, leaning her forehead against me. We slowly break apart and walk toward the door, hands intertwined.

"Yes," I exhale. "Definitely liking the dress."

There's a meeting room for the leaders near the control room, with an entire wall of glass looking down on the Pit. The room is already full by the time we get there. Fortunately, there's a tray of food and coffee in one corner of the room, and Tris and I head straight for it.

We find a spot at the table next to Leo, our hands full of food. Evelyn catches my eye. "We can start now," she shouts over the noise, clapping her hands.

Tris leans over to Leo. "What's this about?" I lean over, too, so I can hear his answer.

"No clue," he says. "Cara and I only just found out about it - Tori's avoiding me." He looks at us and smiles. "Sleep much?" I can feel myself flush, and Tris is bright red, looking down. Leo looks at me, eyebrows up.

"Uh, we were both out like a light and I don't think either of us even moved until Harrison knocked on the door."

Leo chuckles. "I see," but he still gives me a questioning look. I shake my head slightly, as if to say "later."

"Where's Cara?" Tris asks.

"Over with Linus," he says, pointing across the table. She's in an intense discussion with Linus and Marcus. I catch my breath. Tris squeezes my hand under the table, and I squeeze back gratefully.

"Okay, people!" Evelyn says, even louder. The faction leaders crowd around the table, and it looks as though each has brought their faction liaisons with them, who mill behind. The room is crowded.

"Thank you all for coming. Let's get right to business. First, I assume you have all selected your liaisons and representatives to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission?" Tris and I look at each other.

Evelyn catches the look. "Tobias," she says, and I interrupt her, saying "Four, please." She inclines her head. "Fine. Four. We know you haven't had a chance to do so. Whenever you're ready."

I look pointedly at Tris, and she says, "Thank you, Evelyn," squeezing my hand under the table again.


	36. Chapter 36

"Candor has chosen its liaisons," a deep-voiced older woman booms. "And we have also elected a new leader. I am Rowena." She introduces each of her representatives, and the only one I recognize is Lucy Kang, Jack Kang's sister, who will be the liaison to Erudite.

Everyone murmurs words of welcome.

"Amity, too, has a new leader," Johanna says. "Christopher will be our voice." The man next to her looks young – about my age, blond scruffy beard crawling across his chin. "I will be the delegate to Abnegation and to the Commission," she continues, "but I am here to assist Christopher with a smooth transition." More murmurs.

Once everyone has confirmed that they have chosen their leaders and introduced their representatives, Evelyn moves on.

She notes that Freedom is in the process of selecting a new headquarters, but that Abnegation has offered to host them in the meantime. "I myself," she adds, "will remain in Erudite headquarters with an armed guard." I look at Linus, expecting him to look grim, but he just smiles at Evelyn and gives her a cheery little wave.

"Divergent," she says, turning to us. "No one is particularly happy with your decision to pursue a mission outside the fence, but everyone recognizes the necessity of it. All factions will give you whatever support you require. When do you think you will be ready to go?" she asks pointedly.

"By the end of the week," Tris says firmly. I'm not so sure, but I nod.

"Good," she says. "We look forward to hearing your plan. Now, I believe Abnegation has something to discuss, related to your mission." I watch Evelyn as she turns toward Marcus, her face expressionless. I have a still-frame memory of her looking up at him like that, only her face is full of fear, and she's crouching in the corner of our kitchen. Evelyn catches me staring at her and meets my eyes. I don't know if she has any idea what I'm thinking; in fact, she's careful to keep her face blank. She gives me a very slight nod, though, and I return it. I will never forgive her and I can't love her, but I don't blame her.

"There is a reason Abnegation leaders decided it was time to show everyone the truth about why we are here," Marcus begins, in his most self-important voice. "You know that Amity raises your food, but did you ever stop to wonder who makes your clothes? Your computers? Your medical equipment? This city has some modest manufacturing capacity, but not much, and few skilled workers."

Marcus pauses, and I have to admit that he's effective. Even though I know he's a manipulative liar, I am caught up in what he's saying.

"Those things have been provided to us. For decades, someone kept our warehouses full, our electricity running, and our water flowing."

I feel a sense of dread as I realize what he's going to say. Evelyn is frowning, too, and Tris's palm is sweating against my own.

"Well, it all stopped. Whoever was taking care of us isn't taking care of us anymore. Our warehouses are almost empty - we haven't taken a new delivery of finished items in nearly a decade. Our water quality is down - nearly undrinkable. That is the reason Abnegation leaders decided it was time to share the Amanda Ritter file. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of showing it to Jeanine Matthews first."

"How is the power still on?" Linus asks.

"We don't know," Marcus admits. "The power plant is not on our maps. We don't know if someone is still running it, or if it's a particularly durable technology. But that's why we put the conservation rules in place."

"So, Tobias," Marcus says, staring at me, everyone else in the room turning to look. "I always knew you would have a mission, and that it was destined to be a hard one. Now you know, too. When you go outside the wall, you not only have to tell the people who put us here that despite our best efforts to sabotage their experiment, we have fulfilled our purpose and have a large Divergent population. But you will also have to find out if there's anyone left who cares or even knows that we're here. And if you can't figure that out, we may all be going outside the fence soon." I am on the verge of asking him if he always knew that Evelyn's mission was going to be a hard one, too, and that's why he beat us both, but the look of disgust and hatred on her face stops me, as she stares at Marcus. Both Tris and Leo are leaning into me, Tris clutching tightly at my hand, and I focus on my breathing. Then Rowena cuts through my turmoil with her cavernous voice.

"Now, Marcus," she chides, "that's a little dramatic, don't you think? We have food, we have solar power, we have water and the means to treat it - we can sustain ourselves."

"Hardly," Marcus sniffs, looking down his nose at her. "This area lacks many natural resources - if nothing else, we would have great difficulty heating our homes and cooking our food without outside help."

"And I am sorry to add that our crop yields are down overall," Johanna comments. "We are running low on some of the fertilizers and other inputs we had stockpiled. Erudite is attempting to synthesize them with raw materials we have available but hasn't fully succeeded yet. We can grow crops fine with the practices we have developed, but not with the abundance we are used to."

"Of course, we do have a rather large supply of scrap metal," Marcus breaks in, "and I understand the Dauntless have a working forge, so at least we'll still be able to make bullets to shoot each other with."

Marcus stops talking to allow the room to take in what he's said. If there's one thing Abnegation are good at, it's setting the stage for a meaningful hush, and no one is better than Marcus.

"I think we're going to need more than a week to get ready," I say into the silence. "So, if we're done here, we're going to go get started. Anyone who wants to help can come with us."


	37. Chapter 37

Tris and I go straight to the control room. Soon, we have a crowd with us, and not just Divergent, but people from all factions. Leo, Cara, and Linus, of course, but also Fernando - he volunteered to be Erudite's liaison to Divergent. Uriah shows up, bringing Zeke, Shauna, Inez, and Lynn. Johanna drops by with Christopher, who turns out to be Divergent. He's going to stay in Amity, but he wants to help us plan.

We agree to four main lines of effort to prepare for the mission: Cara is going to research the purple serum and the computer records, and Linus agreed that she could bring over some of the researchers she trusts. Tris and I are in charge of finding and recruiting Divergent. Leo, Lynn, and Fernando will design a training program, which will include physical, mental, emotional, and survivalist modules. Uriah, Zeke, and Inez will figure out what equipment we're going to need, which we all agree will include scavenger teams to explore the city for useful raw materials - for the mission, but also for the factions. Fernando will help them, too, with new technologies. Tris is in charge of planning the actual mission, though I and all the team leads will help her.

We agree that Divergent should be headquartered at Dauntless for now, if Tori and Harrison give their consent. Much to my surprise, Shauna volunteers to organize the living and meeting space for the Divergent, to include scouting for a long-term headquarters. She notices me looking at her and crosses her arms defensively. "What?" she snaps. "You don't think I can be useful anymore?"

"I'm just surprised you want to be," I note.

She flushes, keeping her arms crossed. "Of course I want to," she declares. She glances at Zeke, who gives me his best death glare, but he winks when she looks away.

Then Marcus saunters in.

"What do you want?" Tris demands.

"I've come to be of assistance," he says smoothly, not looking at me.

"Well, we don't want you. You are not welcome here," she shoots back. "Leave. Now."

"Beatrice," he says to her, with exaggerated patience, "I am not interested in what a 16 year-old girl wants from minute to minute. There is more at stake than you can possibly understand." He pauses, crossing his arms. "And in any case, I would hope that my son is man enough at this point in his life to speak for himself if he has something to say to me."

The room goes completely still. I feel anger rising in me like floodwater; I will suffocate if I can't break the surface. I stand, clenching my right fist, ready to beat him again - he's definitely asking for it. But then Tris's cool hand cups over my fist, pulling me up like a lifeline.

I exhale noisily and do something even I didn't expect.

I laugh.

"Oh Marcus," I say, letting my fingers uncurl into Tris's. "What would you know about manhood?"

Marcus's mouth falls open, and he stares at me. He's used to people doing what he expects them to, and this is not what he expects from me.

"The only thing that makes you feel strong is beating up children and women. But it was never enough to make you feel like a man, was it?"

I laugh again, this time with relief. My shoulders actually do feel lighter, as though a burden I didn't even know I was carrying around with me has been lifted off.

"And for what it's worth, I'm man enough to like it when the woman I love stands up for me," I say, pulling Tris into my arms and kissing her soundly, in front of everyone, and Tris only hesitates for a second before kissing me back. I'm dimly aware that people in the room are whooping and cheering.

We are both smiling when we pull apart. Marcus turns on his heel and stalks toward the door.

Tori arranges to have food brought up to us so the teams can continue working. She and Harrison both come by, readily agreeing to shelter the Divergent for as long as is necessary. Harrison sticks around to help the training team, and Tori chats with us about recruiting. Tris looks at her. "Are we going to find your name in the records, Tori?" she asks quietly. Tori smiles. "No, you won't find my name there," she says. "But the aptitude test isn't always right, is it, Four?" She nods coldly at Leo before leaving, but at least she acknowledges him - it's a step up.

We load the data chip into a computer and start reading through the lists - they go back 10 years. There are hundreds of Divergent on the terminated and Factionless lists. Then there's a watch list and a known-at-large list, which only has about 20 people on it, including me, Tris, and Marcus. And Tori is wrong; she is on the watch list with a notation that her older brother, Edward (terminated), was Divergent. I find Amar Sadawy on the terminated list, and then Leila Sadawy on the watch list - I did not know he had a sister.

The teams continue planning into the night, but Leo finally stops us around 11:00.

"This is the most important mission most of us may ever be involved in," he says as the group falls silent. "It's important that we are all at our best, and that we function as a team - whether you're part of the Divergent group that will go forward, or the faction support that will stay behind. So I strongly recommend that we all go get a drink together and then get some sleep. Sound good, Four?"

I nod, even though my preference would be to keep going. "Back here at 7:00 a.m.," I say, to a roomful of groans and exclamations. "I could make it earlier," I say mildly. There's hasty assent before we all head to the bar.


	38. Chapter 38

_**OK, interested in how people feel about this, and whether it's realistic that Leo & Four would have this kind of conversation. Not so much about Tris, but about Leo & Four. It's not really a guy thing to talk about each other, but they're in extreme circumstances...**_

Leo and I sit off to one side, talking about the mission. I keep one eye on Tris, who looks like she's having a good time with Uriah, Lynn, Fernando, and Inez.

Leo clears his throat. "Four," he says, "there's something I want to talk to you about - something serious." He pauses to take a drink. "No one can replace Sam for me, I'm not looking for that. But I feel like you're becoming another brother to me."

I tense at his words, not sure if I can afford to feel the same way.

He rubs the back of his neck awkwardly. "I don't know how to say this," he starts, "but now that I know about your dad, I'm really sorry. And I'm sorry that I hit you, too." He looks at me anxiously.

"I'm...I'm not sure what to say."

Apparently, Leo isn't either, so we sit there for a few minutes, in an uncomfortable silence.

"Do you think you'll ever be able to get past it?" he says softly, "to trust me?"

"I'm already past it, Leo," I say sincerely. "It's not the same. What you did is much, much worse, but that's not about the fact that you kicked the crap out of me. That's about the massacre of the Abnegation. I don't know what to tell you about that. You've done a lot to make up for it, but it's not up to me to give you forgiveness."

"In fact, Tris is one of the people you should talk to. Both her parents died in the attack." Leo winces.

We look over at Tris and see Uriah doing a body shot off her neck.

"She seems to be healing," I say dryly. "But look, don't worry about me. I was your prisoner, not your son." I grin at him, trying to lighten the mood. "The expectations are a little different."

Leo smiles. We both watch Tris for a little while. "It's good to see her acting her age for a change," he says, taking a long swig of beer.

"So, Max told me there was one initiate this year with only seven fears," he says casually. "Pretty unusual. But the part he thought was even more unusual was that one of her fears was about having sex. They all thought that was funny. Except for that psychopath, Eric, who offered to personally cure her." Not for the first time, I am glad I killed Eric. "Want to talk about it?" Leo asks.

I sigh. Sounds like Leo is determined to be brotherly. "Yeah," I say. "That was Tris."

"Was, or still is?"

"I'm not sure," I admit, telling him about the night before she turned herself in.

"Wow. That sucks, man."

"If that's the best you got, then you're fired from this brother thing."

Leo chuckles. "I'll get Cara to talk to her," he holds up his hand as I start to protest. "Cara's smart," he says. "She'll know how to talk about it. Besides," he adds, "she already guessed."

"Look," he says, "just take it slow - especially tonight." He dips his chin toward Tris. "Don't do too much when she's been drinking, no matter what she says, okay?" I nod, intensely embarrassed, but I also appreciate the advice.

"You obviously have it bad for each other - it's almost hard to be in the room with you two without needing a cold shower."

"Look who's talking!"

"Yeah, right?" he grins. "I would have never guessed an Erudite would be my type, but she does it for me like no other woman I've ever been with. It's like I can't get enough of her."

"It'll be the same for you and Tris," he adds, and then gives me some specific, very graphic advice about female anatomy.

"First time's the hardest," he sighs, "to get started, and to get over. Not that I think you and Tris are temporary," he says hastily.

"Was Tori your first?" I ask him.

He shakes his head. "But I was hers." He sighs again.

"Now what could you guys possibly be talking about?" Cara says, kissing the back of Leo's neck and wrapping her arms around his chest.

"What men usually talk about," Leo chuckles. "War and sex."


	39. Chapter 39

Cara rolls her eyes. "And what do you think women talk about? Shoes?" She pulls up another stool, close enough to Leo that their thighs are touching. He rests his hand along the inside of her forearm, stroking it slowly.

"So, I've been thinking, Four," she says seriously, "that we need to develop a new assessment tool for you."

"What do you mean?"

"A test that will help you identify Divergence more easily. Maybe even something you and Tris can carry with you."

I raise my eyebrows. "You think that can be done?"

She nods vigorously. "There are genetic markers I can isolate," she explains, "and I think we can give you a way to see them with a drop of blood."

"Markers?" I ask.

"Genetic markers – you remember your school biology classes, right? Genes, the 'building blocks of life'?" she continues, so lost in her ideas that she's hardly even looking at me anymore. "We developed some ways to identify certain sequences – and Linus actually isolated the genetic code for Divergence a long time ago." She explains that she and Linus had been working on test fluid that would change colors in the presence of certain genetic markers in a drop of blood. We agree to experiment with some concoctions in the morning.

"Speaking of experiments, do you think you develop a serum that could help augment the training?" Leo breaks in with interest. "Because we have so little time, and we may have a pretty steep learning curve for some of these people. Combining the physical training with a challenge serum could be one way to speed things up."

Cara looks thoughtful for a moment, and then the two of them break into a rapid fire exchange about what the serum would do and how it might work. I add in a few words here and there, but they are able to communicate with each other in shorthand, a staccato pace that pretty much shuts me out.

"So, you and Tris don't have sex, huh?" Cara says suddenly, and I just stare at her, mouth open stupidly at the abrupt shift in the conversation. Leo snorts beer out his nose.

"Ow, ow, ow," he says, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Cara smirks at him. "Sex and war, sweetheart," she says innocently.

"So?" she says again, watching me with a light in her eyes that somehow manages to be mischievous and sympathetic all at the same time.

I just continue looking at her, speechless.

"Very Abnegation," she comments, sipping at the dark red drink in her hands. I wonder if she's had too much to drink maybe.

Almost on cue, warm, moist hands press to my shoulders, and a hiccup echoes in my ear. "What's Abnegation?" Tris says, slurring her S a little.

Cara looks at Tris for a moment, tilting her head and taking in the fact that Tris is obviously drunk. Cara smiles, with that same evil-kind look in her eyes.

"Discomfort about desire," Cara says. "It's very Abnegation to feel guilty about sex," she elaborates matter of factly. "I never understood why that was necessary."

"Oh, look at the time!" Leo says hastily, rising from his stool and faking a yawn. "If I remember right, someone wants us up and in the meeting room by 7:00." I just smile at him uneasily.

"But I'm having way too much fun," Cara complains, as he takes her elbow and starts steering her out of the room. Leo squeezes my shoulder on his way past, shooting me an apologetic look.

"See you in the morning, Tris," he says warmly.

"G'night, Leo," she responds, brow furrowed.

Cara pulls her elbow out of Leo's grasp and hugs Tris fiercely, whispering something in her ear. Leo looks at me a little desperately and grabs Cara around the waist, dragging her from the bar.

Tris looks at me, the crease between her eyes deepening. "What did she mean?" she says, shaking her head. "About forgetting the seventh fear? What did you tell her!" Tris is starting to flush angrily.

I groan inwardly. "Um, can we talk about it back in the apartment?"

Tris stalks out of the bar.


	40. Chapter 40

I have to jog to catch up with Tris, which is saying something, given that my legs are practically twice as long as hers.

"Tris, wait," I say, catching her by the shoulder. She hisses at me, and I realize I've grabbed her wounded shoulder. "Sorry, I'm sorry, but just slow down for a second, okay?"

She wrenches her shoulder from under my hand and whirls around to glare at me. "I'm glad you all think it's so funny, _Four," _she spits out. "I bet you all had a lot of laughs watching me make a fool of myself in the simulation." She narrows her eyes. "Just what did you see, anyway?"

I feel my temper rising and struggle to bite back an icy remark. I take a deep breath and hold it while she scowls at me, foot tapping furiously, and then let my breath out slowly. "If you must know," I say quietly, "it was torture. Watching you suffer, and not being able to do anything about it - it was far worse than what they did to me in the cell." I gesture toward the bruises, finally fading to yellow on my face and arms.

"But the worst part by far," I say, lowering my voice and putting my hands gently on her upper arms, "was having to see how you see me." She finally looks up at me, startled.

"Wh...what are you talking about?"

I put one hand under her chin. "I didn't trust you. I tried to control you. Even my voice sounded harsh."

Her eyes are huge, pupils dilated in the dim light of the hall.

"And you didn't trust me, either - you had to lie to me to get to Erudite. You trusted _Marcus _more than you trusted me."

Her cheeks redden, and her eyes are shiny. She is silent for a long stretch, and I can tell she remembers. "Can we go home now?" she finally says plaintively. "I just want to go home."

But Uriah was right - we don't really have a home anymore. Somehow, I don't think that would be a very comforting thing to say at the moment. So I take her hand and lead her down the hall to my apartment, the closest thing we have to a home.

Neither of us says a word as we get ready for bed. I ease under the covers while Tris is still in the bathroom. My whole body pulses with weariness, but I'm also wide awake, waiting for her. Tris turns off the light and slips in next to me.

She turns her head and looks at me, not saying anything for awhile. "I remember how it felt," she says softly, sounding very sober, much to my surprise. "I remember how it felt when I thought you hated me." She watches me carefully. "It felt like a part of me died every time you looked at me like that."

I stroke her cheek. "Well, it didn't happen." I pause, thinking through what I want to say. "But as I've told you before, you're one of the most perceptive people I know, and you saw something true about me." I clear my throat and focus my eyes on her chin, not able to look at her eyes directly. "There's a darkness in me, and I can't always control it. I don't... I never want to hurt you." My voice breaks.

"You won't hurt me," she says softly, but with utter conviction. "I love you, Tobias - and I am not afraid of you. I never will be."

Never is a really long time, I think grimly, and I know on a gut level that it will not turn out to be true. There will come a day when she will have a reason to be afraid of me.

But not today, I realize, as she kisses me - a sweet kiss, and her hands on me are comforting, reassuring. So I'm unprepared for the jolt that goes through me when she suddenly moves her hands along and under the waistband of my boxers. I start to pull back from her, but she follows me, one hand clamping on the back of my head and keeping me in the kiss.

She pauses to take off her shirt and her shorts, frowning at me as I just look at her in shock.

"Are...are you sure?" I say haltingly. "Maybe we should just go to sleep."

She throws her head back and laughs, then she grabs the hem of my shirt and yanks it up over my head, her tongue tasting my skin. I watch her in disbelief, stroking her hair, running my fingers along her back.

"I love you, too," I finally whisper back, rolling her onto her back and covering her with my body. "You also dreamed about that." I look down at her, rubbing circles on her cheekbone with my thumb, trying to decide if she's acting this way because she's been drinking, or because this is real.

"And what do _you _dream about, Tobias?" she says, her eyes clear and steady, her hands in my hair. She neither looks nor sounds drunk, her breath clear and sweet.

I kiss her behind the ear, and thinking about what Leo told me to do, I dip the tip of my tongue gently in and around the contours of her ear. She gasps and says "oh" in surprise, and then a longer "ohhh," arching her back.

"I'll show you what I dream about," I respond huskily.

_**Thanks for reading - I'm probably going to take a bit of a hiatus from this story. Not too many readers at this point & I'm sort of focused elsewhere. But I do know where I want the story to go - and something actually does happen, I promise! But it may be awhile... Sorry, for those of you who are still reading...**_


	41. Chapter 41

_**AN: been awhile! What do you think?**_

The first thing we do in the morning is head to the medical clinic. Well, okay, it's the second thing we do. We get a scolding for not coming in sooner, but we both leave with contraceptive injections that are good for a year. That's certainly practical, although I grumble that we don't both need one since we're together. Tris, for some reason, thinks this is hilarious.

The truth is that I find it impossible to imagine where I might be a year from now. On the other hand, some things are pretty predictable: I'll still need to eat and sleep and now that I know what I've been missing, I'll also still want to be having sex. Unless I'm dead, I think wryly.

Then it hits me that I'm by no means sure I'll actually be alive in a year. But I do know I will do everything I can to make sure Tris is. In fact, I guess it's just as well that we both have the injections, and so I pretend to think it's funny, too, and I laugh with her. Tris raises her eyebrows at me in a way that communicates that I'm not fooling her. I may have been inside her head, but she's the one who seems to know what I'm always thinking. It's a little annoying, actually.

Cara won't look at us when we get to the meeting room, and Leo won't stop looking at us.

"Everything alright?" he asks casually, sidling up to me at the coffee pot.

"Yeah, fine." I say neutrally, through a mouthful of muffin. "We're going to head off soon - might as well see if any of the known Divergent are still out there."

He glances at me, a question mark in his eyes, and I lift my shoulders in response. "Yeah, I know," I say, deliberately misinterpreting his look and sighing heavily. "I don't really expect to find any of them alive or sane, either, but we have to try." I grasp his shoulder and then start to walk away.

"Oh, and Leo," I add, turning around, and spreading my arms out. "You were right about that ear thing and all of that. Thanks for the advice," I smirk at him, and he throws a muffin at my head with an exclamation, but he looks inordinately pleased, and more than a little relieved.

Leo isn't pleased that Tris and I insist on going out into the city alone, however, nor are Harrison and Tori. We finally agree to at least take Inez with us, since she knows more about how to move around the city without being seen, but they are still reluctant.

"Look," I say impatiently, "being light on our feet, low profile, and Divergent is the best way both to keep safe and gain the trust of other Divergent."

"Yeah, and how will they know you're Divergent from just looking?" Leo grumbles. "It's not like it's tattooed on your forehead."

"Hey, that's a good idea!" Tris calls out brightly from across the room. "Let's go get tattoos on our foreheads! What do you think, Tori? What should the Divergent symbol be? A broken dish? A fork in a road? Maybe an unblinking eye?"

Leo looks at her steadily and comments wryly, "I think I liked it better when you were just scary and kind of sullen."

"I'm still scary," she says with satisfaction.

In the end, they agree to let us go alone largely because Fernando gives us an electronic beacon. We can activate it if there's trouble and communicate directly with Cara through the Dauntless computers. It doesn't last very long and the range won't go past Amity, but it's enough for now. Fernando is muttering about batteries and frequencies and writing out equations on a napkin before we even walk away, so an improved beacon can't be far behind.

We crunch across the frozen ground to the train tracks and discuss where we should go to find the Factionless we're looking for. Fully half of the known Divergent, including Laila, are Factionless, which is why I relented on having Inez to come with us. Otherwise, I would have preferred to be alone with Tris.

"Hard to say where they'll be," Inez sniffs, wiping her nose on the back of her hand. She herself was on the suspected list, though it's not clear why. Her aptitude test was conclusively Dauntless; she just didn't pass the initiation.

"But I would guess Abnegation. That's where Evelyn said they'd be. Good, available shelter and food, and the Abnegation were generally friendly to us." She shoots me a sidelong glance. "But I doubt Evelyn herself is there."

This is ideal, as I'd rather avoid Evelyn in general right now and don't want to risk her interfering in our mission. I just hope we can get in and out without Marcus knowing we're there. I can't imagine he won't do something to make our mission more complicated.

When it's time to move, I notice that Inez jumps off the train readily and lands lightly on her feet. I wonder why she didn't make the cut at Dauntless?

"She was ranked second in her year," Tris says softly at my elbow. "One of the Dauntless leaders decided to cut her - told her she needed to disappear for her own safety."

I frown at Tris. "How do you know that?"

"Inez told me, of course," she smirks.

"And why do you always know what I'm thinking?" I say, with some irritation. "I'm the one who saw inside your brain, not the other way around."

She shrugs. "I can just tell when you're thinking, and now that I know for a fact that our minds work the same way, I just sort of assume you're thinking what I would be."

"Yeah, well," I mutter. "You're not always going to be right."

I can practically hear her eyes rolling.

Although the Abnegation sector appears to be abandoned, we can see the signs that someone has been trying to clean it up. But the evidence of the massacre that took place here won't be so easy to erase: there are bullet holes, broken concrete, and the outlines of bloodstains still sketched on the ground. I reach back and grab Tris's hand, and she clutches mine gratefully.

"Old habits die hard," Inez says softly. I wait for her to explain. "Factionless are used to hiding, so that's why you don't see anyone outside." Speaking of old habits, we arrive at Tris's house before either of us even realizes that's where we're going.

"Do you want to go in?" I ask her tentatively.

"Someone probably lives there now," she says evasively.

"So we'll knock," Inez shrugs, striding up to the door. No one answers right away, though I see a curtain on an upstairs window move. A few minutes later, the door opens a sliver.

"That you, Inez?" a cracked voice says.

"Yeah, it's me," she says. "Can I come in for a minute Yolo? With my friends?"

"Yeah, sure," the voice says nonchalantly.

There are probably 20 people in the living room, eating, talking, playing cards. Some look up at us in curiosity when we come in; most don't.

Tris lets my hand fall from hers. If she sees anything amiss in having her home occupied or if really, if she feels anything at all, it doesn't show. Her face is as blank as the walls around us. Abnegation houses generally don't have much in the way of personal effects, so that's no surprise.

"Why don't you look around?" I say softly. "I'll stay here with Inez." Tris nods and heads for the stairs.

"You want something to eat?" the woman named Yolo asks me.

"Yeah, sure," I respond. Inez coached us that you never turn down an offer of food in Factionless. First, because you can never be sure when you might see food again, and second, because Factionless don't trust anyone who turns down food. She offers me a piece of the knobby Amity bread, which I'm suspicious might be spiked, and some tired looking fruit. I opt for a wrinkled apple.

"Thanks," I say.

Inez is hugging a short, bald man, dusky skinned and craggy faced, but with a compelling light in his eyes. "Hey, Bobby, this is my friend, Toby. Toby, this is Bobby." I say hello and try not react to my new nickname, which I don't like at all.

"So, where you been, Inez? No one's seen you for days. I was getting worried about you."

"Yeah, you always were a worrywart. The boss sent me off with these guys - they're Dauntless. We're trying to figure out what the hell's going on." At first, I'm a little uneasy about how well Inez lies, but then I think about it and decide she's not really lying. Just telling one facet of the truth.

Bobby looks at me in surprise. "You're hanging out with Dauntless now?"

She shrugs. "They're not so bad, you know. Hard people, but soft beds - and they have good eats. They like cake."

He laughs. "Well, that doesn't sound so bad," he allows, hitting me on the shoulder. I smile back at him.

"We're looking for the sister of Toby's friend, Amar," Inez says easily. "Laila Sadawy. Ring a bell?"

Bobby cocks his head for a moment, then shakes it. "Sounds a little familiar," he says vaguely, "but no one I know. I'll ask around."

He walks away from us.

"Should we try another house?" I say quietly. Inez shakes her head.

"Just be patient," she murmurs. "If she's alive and wants to see you, she'll come to you. That's how it works here."

Just then, there's a commotion upstairs, and a woman with broad, square shoulders, jowls quivering in rage, drags Tris down the stairs by the hair. "I caught this one stealing!" she bellows. "Stealing!"

"Uh oh," Inez breathes.

"Let me go!" Tris yells, and I move to help her. Inez grabs my arm. "Don't," she says urgently. "It'll only be worse if you start a fight." I grind my teeth and look at Inez through narrowed eyes, but she returns my glare with utter calm, and her confidence keeps me at bay. For the moment.

Bobby steps to the foot of the stairs. "I don't know who you are," he says quietly, "but Factionless don't steal from each other."

"Well, I'm not Factionless," Tris scowls at him. "And I wasn't stealing."

"Then how do you explain the fact that this was in your pocket?" the woman huffs, and she holds out a blue glass statue. The blue glass statue. My breath freezes in my throat.

"Well?" Bobby says, his tone mild, but there's a hard look in his eyes.

"It's mine," Tris says defiantly, but I notice she doesn't try to snatch it back. "It's not stealing if it belongs to you, right? My mother gave that to me," she finishes more softly.

The room falls silent and still.

Comprehension dawns in Bobby's eyes. "This was your house," he states, and Tris nods slightly.

There's a long silence, as everyone stares at Tris. She will not look at anyone, however, and stares angrily at her feet.

"I'm sorry for your loss." Bobby finally says gently, a phrase repeated quietly around the room, as if it's something often said in Factionless. "Most of us who are staying in this house knew your parents. They were good to us." The signal he gives the big woman on the stairs is slight, but the twitch of his fingers produces immediate results, and she hands the statue back to Tris.

"Thank you," she says quietly, still looking down, but less as though she'd like to kill her own shoes.

For the next hour, a steady stream of people approach Tris to share their memories of her parents, and the many ways they had helped each one of them. Some try to give Tris small mementos they have found in the house - her mother's hairpins, her father's spare spectacles - but with almost all of them, she closes their hands reverentially over the item as though it's a relic and says that her parents would have wanted them to keep it.

It's very moving and all, but I am getting increasingly restless when I realize Bobby is standing next to me, giving me an appraising look.

"So what do you really want, Tobias?"

I look at him in surprise, and he smiles at me. He's obviously a leader among the Factionless, and of course he would have realized right away who I was. I wonder if Evelyn already knows that I'm here and has guessed what I want. I decide there's no point in lying to him. "We really are looking for Laila," I say, "but there are others."

"Do you have a list?" he asks.

I hesitate, and then nod reluctantly. He raises his eyebrows quizzically.

"Some of them probably won't want to be found," I start.

He smiles again, sardonically this time, holding out his hand. "Welcome to Freedom, my friend." He looks at my list intently. "You're looking for Divergent," he says flatly.

"Yes," I say.

He hands me back the list. "If we wouldn't help Erudite hunt them down, we certainly won't help Dauntless do it," his even, mild tone is at odds with the hardness in his eyes, and I realize that the people who were standing so casually around him are no longer casual, and they are armed. I hadn't noticed any weapons in the house until now.

"It's not like that," I say quietly into the now charged room. "You must know the Erudite tortured both Tris and me because we're Divergent and tried to kill us, too. I thought everyone knew that by now." I pause and look at him, and he nods at me, a little of the hardness gone from his eyes. "We're looking for them because we need them. We all do, if our city is going to survive."

Inez has come up behind me. "Me, too, Bobby," she says. "I'm Divergent - you knew that, and now everyone else here does, too. We're going outside the wall to save your lazy ass," she drawls. "And we need help."


	42. Chapter 42

Bobby turns to Inez in silence, his shoulders tense. She returns his look evenly, giving every appearance of enjoying herself. Looking at her, you'd assume this is an entertaining social call for her if you didn't know there was a concealed weapon right where her right hand is resting so casually on her hip.

I draw in a breath to say something to break the standoff, when Bobby's hand suddenly shoots out. I hear a safety being flipped off a gun over near the stairs.

But he just chucks Inez on the shoulder and barks out an odd, harsh laugh. "Always wanted to be Dauntless, didn't you, Inez? Looks like you get to play at it now," he shakes her shoulder a little, and she shrugs with that little half-smile springing up on her lips. "Better than playing Abnegation," she retorts pleasantly, eyes sweeping the room.

"Soon enough," he responds softly, "we won't have to play at anything." He looks at her intently. "You should stay with us, Inez. With me. They can't offer you anything but pain - it's a lost cause." His eyes flick to me. "Sorry, man," he mutters. "But it's true."

I draw in a breath, but this time, it's Tris who speaks up before I can respond.

"I wonder how many times my parents heard that," she says quietly, "whenever they did something to help all of you." Tris looks around the room, and most people look back at her. Some drop their gazes. "They never accepted that the Factionless were a lost cause. And I don't accept that our mission is, either. In fact, I think going outside the fence is the only way to save the life of every single person in this room, every person inside the fence, no matter what faction."

I look at Bobby, and wait until he feels my eyes on him.

"Will you help us?" I ask, when he finally turns toward me.

His jaw is clenched, and the stare he gives me is not especially friendly, but after a brief hesitation, he nods. "Wait here," he says, before turning on his heel and walking out the front door, bodyguards in tow.

Everyone in the room instantly goes back to business as usual - playing cards, dice, eating, talking. Whatever they were doing when we walked in. Inez, Tris, and I retreat to a corner to wait. I notice Tris casually flip the safety back on the gun in her waistband, and raise my eyebrows at her.

"That was you?"

She just looks at me. I nod. Good. That's progress; she was ready to shoot if she had to, even if that wouldn't have been a smart choice in the circumstances. We were outmanned and outgunned, but the fact that the instinct is still there is a relief.

"Okay. What now, Inez? Is he going to come back here with Evelyn or Marcus or - God forbid - both, and we're back at square one?"

"Don't think so."

I stare at her pointedly. Eventually, she relents.

"Leadership is actually pretty decentralized in Factionless. If he said he would help, he meant it. If he thought he needed someone else's permission, or if he already had orders on this, he wouldn't have put himself out there." She pauses, taking out a knife and starting to pare her fingernails. "Bobby was a leader here long before Evelyn showed up."

"And we just happened to find him?" Tris says skeptically.

Inez shoots a glance at her before turning back to her nails. "Nah. I knew where he was and figured he'd help. You guys are pretty easy to steer sometimes."

"You could have told us," I say coldly.

Inez shrugs with that half-smile. "You think too much sometimes," she offers. "And Factionless have pretty good shit detectors. You got to keep it real here." She glances at Tris. "I shoulda told you it was your parents' house, though. Sorry."

"It's okay," Tris answers quickly. "It doesn't bother me." Inez nods.

"I used to help your Mom distribute stuff," she says quietly, watching Tris closely.

Tris's mouth drifts open. "You knew her?"

Inez clears her throat. "Her mother - your grandmother - was a Dauntless leader. Did you know that? Well, that's who kicked me out of Dauntless. She probably saved my life. We talked about it a little, your mom and me."

Tris is standing stock still, mouth still hanging open.

"I think they got her pretty soon after that. Your mom wasn't sure what happened - just that she died. I hope it wasn't because of me." Inez has gone back to her fingernails.

I move behind Tris and put my hands on her shoulders. "Inez," she stutters, "I...I don't know..."

"It's okay, Tris," she says, looking up. "Pretty sure we're going to have a lot of time together to talk about it."

Tris doesn't say anything, but she does lean back into me, and I can't help smiling. I'm glad she's finally looking to me for comfort, that's she's showing some trust in me. I tighten my hands on her shoulders a little and brush her hair with my lips.

Then I look up and see Inez watching me appraisingly. She meets my eyes, but her expression offers no clue as to what she's thinking, beyond the fact that she's thinking something. From what I've seen of her so far, Inez will no doubt let me know what's on her mind in her own good time. I return her neutral look.

We both turn away, though, when we hear the door open. Bobby walks in, followed by his phalanx of guards, and then three new people. As they come into the room, one of them looks straight at me, and I freeze, dropping my arms to my side in shock.

Laila Sadawy looks _exactly_ like her brother.

Bobby hands me back my list. "Four dead, two missing, one doesn't want to talk to you. These three have agreed to at least hear you out," he hooks his thumb back at Laila and the two men with her.

Laila is sort of average height and lean, with dark, smooth skin and long, black hair twisted back in a braid. She looks young - maybe in her early 20s, the age Amar was when he died. But as she meets my gaze, the tired, hard look in her eyes makes me think she's quite a bit older than that. One of the men is definitely older - tall and stooped, with graying hair and glasses. He has a scar on his face that runs from his ear over to his jaw. But the most jarring thing about him by far is the kindly look on his face and wide smile. "Ralph," he says, sticking out a hand, "but you can call me Rat. Everybody does." He shakes each of our hands, even Inez's, with great enthusiasm.

"Hey, Rat," she says, smiling at him - an actual, full smile.

"I'm Jeb," the other man says, or rather, boy. I frown at him. "How old are you?" I ask severely.

"16," he shrugs. "I'm from here," he adds, gesturing around the room. I know he doesn't mean Abnegation.

"How is that even possible?" I ask.

"People do have babies here, too, you know," Bobby says coldly.

"You grew up in Factionless?" Tris asks him, startled. Jeb nods, looking a little annoyed.

"Okay," I exhale. "Listen, the three of us are the leaders of a new Divergent team," I can feel amusement rolling off Inez at her sudden promotion to leader. "I'm Tobias, this is Tris, and you probably all know Inez." I pause, picking my words carefully. "We're all Divergent, and we believe the three of you are, too."

"And what makes you think that?" Laila asks quietly. Her voice is low and musical, and it almost hurts to hear the familiar cadences.

"We stole some records from Erudite," Tris says matter-of -factly, "when we were destroying their computers. They had all of you on a list of known Divergent."

Rat and Jeb look at each other uneasily, but Laila never even blinks.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see a woman slip in the front door and approach Bobby. She whispers in his ear and then leaves as quickly as she arrived.

"What do you want with us?" Laila asks, crossing her arms.

"I suggest you think about the answer to that as you leave," Bobby says smoothly. "Unless you'd like to discuss what you're doing here with Marcus and whoever it is he has with him."

Inez is the first to move, so smoothly and quietly it takes me a minute to realize she's gone.

"Take the tunnel, Inez," Bobby calls after her. "And you're always welcome here once you get tired of pretending to be Dauntless."

Inez never slows down or looks back, and we hurry after her. As we cut across the lawn of the house behind the Prior's, I'm relieved to realize all three of the Divergent Factionless are following us. I have no idea if they're really Divergent, since we didn't have a chance to test them yet, and even less of an idea as to whether we can trust them, but at least they're with us.

For now.


End file.
